I noticed that when I was trying to achieve my goals, I had no motivation to do the things required to achieve them.  It’s an odd phenomenon. They are, after all, my goals. Why wouldn’t I be motivated to achieve them? This led me to research motivation to figure out exactly what was happening. I’ve read several books on motivation and have distilled it to its basic core.

Values & Flow

In order for you to become motivated, your brain makes a seemingly simple calculation: Is the effort required to do something, less than the value of doing it? In other words, you won’t feel like doing something if it’s not worth it. But behind this calculation are two foundational concepts that motivate us: Flow and Values.

Flow

“Flow” is when a task is in the sweet spot of difficulty: Not too difficult to be frustrating and not too easy to be boring. This makes a task enjoyable, and it’s easy to become motivated to do tasks that are enjoyable. In his book Flow, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi writes about how some people have personalities that can achieve flow in just about any task, but he also discusses what a task needs in order to be enjoyable:

As our studies have suggested, the phenomenology of enjoyment has eight major components. When people reflect on how it feels when their experience is most positive, they mention at least one, and often all, of the following. First, the experience usually occurs when we confront tasks we have a chance of completing. Second, we must be able to concentrate on what we are doing. Third and fourth, the concentration is usually possible because the task undertaken has clear goals and provides immediate feedback. Fifth, one acts with a deep but effortless involvement that removes from awareness the worries and frustrations of everyday life. Sixth, enjoyable experiences allow people to exercise a sense of control over their actions. Seventh, concern for the self disappears, yet paradoxically the sense of self emerges stronger after the flow experience is over. Finally, the sense of the duration of time is altered; hours pass by in minutes, and minutes can stretch out to seem like hours. The combination of all these elements causes a sense of deep enjoyment that is so rewarding people feel that expending a great deal of energy is worthwhile simply to be able to feel it.

Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly. Flow (Harper Perennial Modern Classics) (p. 49). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

The more a job inherently resembles a game—with variety, appropriate and flexible challenges, clear goals, and immediate feedback—the more enjoyable it will be regardless of the worker’s level of development.

Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly. Flow (Harper Perennial Modern Classics) (p. 152). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

Flow can be developed through training and practice.

Initially, you may not be able to achieve flow during a task. That’s normal.  It takes practice, but flow can be developed:

Surgeons usually enter into their long period of training because of exotelic expectations: to help people, to make money, to achieve prestige. If they are lucky, after a while they begin to enjoy their work, and then surgery becomes to a large extent also autotelic. Some things we are initially forced to do against our will turn out in the course of time to be intrinsically rewarding.

Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly. Flow (Harper Perennial Modern Classics) (p. 67). HarperCollins. Kindle Edition.

Values

You may be asking, “How do you get motivated to develop flow?” This is where values come in. Values are one’s core desires in life.  They give one purpose and meaning. They also help us do tasks when we don’t have flow. We’ll do hard tasks even if we don’t enjoy them because their in line with our core values. If your task isn’t in alignment with your core values, it will be more difficult to get motivated to do it.

In his book, Who am I?, Dr. Steven Riess used factor analysis to identify 16 core desires that are common in everyone. They are:

Power is the desire to influence others.
Independence is the desire for self-reliance.
Curiosity is the desire for knowledge.
Acceptance is the desire for inclusion.
Order is the desire for organization.
Saving is the desire to collect things.
Honor is the desire to be loyal to one’s parents and heritage.
Idealism is the desire for social justice.
Social Contact is the desire for companionship.
Family is the desire to raise one’s own children.
Status is the desire for social standing.
Vengeance is the desire to get even.
Romance is the desire for sex and beauty.
Eating is the desire to consume food.
Physical Activity is the desire for exercise of muscles.
Tranquility is the desire for emotional calm.

Reiss, Steven. Who am I? (pp. 17-18). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

In order to be optimally motivated, we must be in alignment with our core desires/values.

Many of us are interested in self-improvement, whether to lose weight, quit smoking, drink less, control our tempers, or worry less. The system of 16 basic desires can help you accomplish most of these goals, since we are most likely to stick with a self-improvement plan that is connected to our most important basic desires. On the other hand, we’re likely to prematurely quit any self-improvement program that is inconsistent with our desire profile. When you set out to change yourself, you need to decide if you are aiming for the short term or the long haul. In the short term, willpower and immediate incentives can provide the motivation you need. Anybody who really wants to do so can improve herself or himself for periods of months or even a year or two. It is mostly a matter of willpower and having a sensible plan. Over the long haul, however, willpower and incentives rarely work. Lasting self-improvement usually requires either that you change your lifestyle to better satisfy your desire profile or that you change your priorities. Knowledge of the 16 basic desires can help you accomplish these goals.

Reiss, Steven. Who am I? (pp. 241-242). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

But being in alignment with our values, doesn’t necessarily mean we’ll have flow. An example is when one values “order” but does not enjoy creating order.  The thought of organizing chaos is overwhelming to them, but they are deeply satisfied when things are put in order for them. Flow may need to be developed to enjoy ordering things, but obtaining the goal of order is enjoyed because it’s valued.

Core values are set by genetics.

Unlike flow, core desires/values cannot be developed. They are primarily set by our genetics, although our culture and beliefs influence how our values are defined.

Although almost everybody embraces the 16 basic desires, individuals vary in how intensely each desire is experienced. These individual differences in desire partially reflect genetic variations across individuals. For example, some people are born with the potential for very strong tendencies toward aggression (indicating a desire for vengeance), whereas others are born with the potential for only weak aggressive tendencies. Some people are born with the potential for enormous curiosity, whereas others are born with the potential for little curiosity. No two people have exactly the same potential for a particular desire. Across all 16 basic desires, the strength of desire varies significantly, depending on both the individual and the desire in question.

Reiss, Steven. Who am I? (pp. 21-22). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

The underlying genes that influence these desires do not change much as we grow older. Can people change, or does a genetic origin of the 16 basic desires imply that our basic personalities are determined at birth? Genes are not the only important influence on basic desires and how we satisfy them. However, the genetic factors in our desires provide significant stability to our behavior. I suspect that people can change, but to a certain degree and not very easily.

Reiss, Steven. Who am I? (p. 23). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

What we desire is largely determined by our genes, but how we fulfill our desires is largely determined by culture and experience.

Reiss, Steven. Who am I? (p. 25). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Resistance & Misalignment

Being in alignment with our values and having flow is typically what is happening when we “feel” motivated.  But when we are struggling with motivation, we are either experiencing resistance to flow or we are misaligned with our core values. Or Both.

Resistance to flow

Having a hard time starting a task and procrastination are signs that you are experiencing resistance to flow.  Most advice on motivation is focused on solving this aspect of motivation. In his book, The War of Art, Steven Pressfield personifies resistance to flow and describes in below:

Have you ever brought home a treadmill and let it gather dust in the attic? Ever quit a diet, a course of yoga, a meditation practice? Have you ever bailed out on a call to embark upon a spiritual practice, dedicate yourself to a humanitarian calling, commit your life to the service of others? Have you ever wanted to be a mother, a doctor, an advocate for the weak and helpless; to run for office, crusade for the planet, campaign for world peace, or to preserve the environment? Late at night have you experienced a vision of the person you might become, the work you could accomplish, the realized being you were meant to be? Are you a writer who doesn’t write, a painter who doesn’t paint, an entrepreneur who never starts a venture? Then you know what Resistance is.

Pressfield, Steven. The War of Art . Black Irish Entertainment LLC. Kindle Edition.

Pressfield’s book explains that Resistance is normal, you will likely encounter it somewhere along the way, but that you still need to do the work, to push through it and to prioritize the work that you value.

Success & Failure. Progress & Setbacks.

A large part of why flow is so motivating is because it gives one a sense of progress. Progress and success affirms your brain’s calculation that a task is worth doing, whereas hardship and failure causes your brain to recalculate that maybe the task is not worth doing and, thus, is demotivating.

Jeff Haden explains in his book The Motivation Myth how important progress is for motivation:

There is only one recipe for gaining motivation: success. Specifically, the dopamine hits we get when we observe ourselves making progress. Not huge, life-changing successes. Those come all too infrequently, if ever. If you want to stay motivated, if you want to stay on track, if you want to keep making progress toward the things you hope to achieve, the key is to enjoy small, seemingly minor successes—but on a regular basis.

Haden, Jeff. The Motivation Myth (p. 3). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Success is so effective in motivating us, that if we have success in one area of our lives, that can help us get motivated in other areas of our lives.  Furthermore, if you see someone being successful, that can also be motivating. This is because it causes our brains recalculate that the task is easy and worth doing, at least initially. You get motivated when you see someone else making money because it looks easy.  High reward, low effort. This is how bubbles in the stock market are formed. Everyone wants in on the action because it looks easy, but by then, it’s too late and the bubble bursts.

The flip side to success is failure and failure avoidance. When you’re afraid that the result of your efforts won’t be as good as you or others expect, then you tend to protect your status by not being motivated to do it. This is called an “ego trap” by Dr. Doug Lisle.

Self-esteem & Self Confidence

If you don’t have confidence that you will succeed, it can be a demotivating factor. Or if you have low self-esteem, this may prevent you from even thinking about attempting a task.  With low self-esteem, it may not always be “I don’t think I’m good enough to do that” but rather, “I don’t feel like doing that”.  This is why it’s so important to remove yourself from a toxic environment that’s damaging your self-esteem.

Competing flow

You may not be motivated to do a task because you are motivated to do another task.  Flow itself can be addictive and could lead to ignoring other important tasks.  Core values help us override the addictive nature of flow.

Misalignment Of Values

You may be able to achieve flow with a task, but without being in alignment with your core values, it will have little to no meaning. You may enjoy 3 hours of playing video games but if your core values are unfulfilled, it will feel like wasted time at the end of the day.  Being in alignment with your core values helps get you past the hard times when you’re not able to achieve flow. Most motivation advice is about trying to overcome resistance to flow. But alignment with core values is just as important.

Shifting values

Your core desires will shift back and forth.  When your top core value is fulfilled, the next core value will want your attention until your top core value needs to be fulfilled again.

This means that we do not consciously choose what we want from life; rather, our deepest desires arise automatically, and as soon as we satisfy one of them, we automatically experience another and want something else.

Reiss, Steven. Who am I? (p. 18). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

This means, that if you want to be motivated to achieve something dealing with one of your lower values, it will be easier if you fulfill your top values first. For example, idealism may be one of my core values, but if tranquility is a higher core value, I’ll have trouble focusing on tasks of idealism in a chaotic environment and won’t feel motivated to do those tasks until tranquility is restored.

Extrinsic vs Intrinsic Motivation – A Nuanced Understanding With Flow & Values

Intrinsic motivation is when you enjoy the work itself. Extrinsic motivation is when you do the work for some goal other than enjoying the work. Intrinsic motivation is far more effective than extrinsic motivation. A frequent example of extrinsic motivation is money.  However, if someone who has a core value of status and status to them is defined as having money, then money may be an intrinsic value.  So even though a goal may be an extrinsic motivated goal, it may also be an intrinsic core value.

The Bottom Line For Motivation

In order to be optimally motivated, you must be in alignment with your core values and able to achieve flow in whatever task you want to achieve.  It may be difficult to achieve flow at first, but this is normal and you must leverage your core desires to motivate yourself through that difficult phase.