Sources of Motivation - Create or Prevent Fulfilment

Recently I have spent a lot of time considering how I want to be motivated. I have also considered what the different types of motivation are and the potential impacts they would have on my life.

From my research and thinking I have come up with two extreme sources of motivation. The concepts themselves are not unique and original, but from what I have found, the way in which I bring them together is.

So, the two extreme sources of motivation are

1. Ensuring your own security / staying alive
2. Providing value for others

The key characteristics of these two sources of motivation are

Ensuring Your Own Security / Staying Alive
-Scarcity mentality
-Based on the belief that there are limited resources and value to go around
-Does not make a person feel great about themselves
-Discourages integrity
-Less likely to produce massive results and unlikely to unlock much of a person's true potential
-Inspired by fear
-Self-orientated
-It is hard to be proud of the results produced by a lifetime of living this way

Providing Value for Others
-Abundance mentality
-Based on the assumption that a person can easily meet their needs and therefore changes their focus to how they can provide value for others
-Can be massively inspiring and motivating
-Encourages integrity
-Very likely to produce massive results and unlock much more of a person's true potential
-Inspired by love
-Others-orientated
-A person can be incredibly proud of the results they have produced and how they have lived after a lifetime of living this way
-When taken far enough it easily takes care of what the other source of motivation seeks to achieve

The above are the two extreme sources of motivation a person may have in life. It is rare to find a person whose motivation comes purely from one source. Most people will have a combination of the two.

What can be taken from this is that as a person moves further to the source of their motivation being to provide value to others they generally improve the quality of their lives.

It can be the case that in the short-run the quality of their life suffers slightly. For example, if a person gives up an hourly wage to try and run a toy manufacturing company they will probably suffer financially in the short-run. However, if the way they add value to others is a passion of theirs (in this case manufacturing toys) then it is highly likely that in the long-run they will increase the quality of their life and help others more. It is also true that if they are doing what they are passionate about then they are very likely to feel much better about themselves and therefore in a way the quality of their life has improved anyway.

Moving between these two sources of motivation is not something that is likely to happen overnight. Western culture heavily conditions people to focus on ensuring their own security, such as through the "get a job culture", rather than how they can contribute to others.

It can also be quite scary to initially make the switch. The most common fear is "if I just focus on adding value to others, then how will I pay the bills and keep my house, etc." The problem with this fear of switching is that it arises specifically because that person is still living with the mindset of being motivated by ensuring their own security. Once they make the leap to the other source of motivation that fear will no longer be relevant. A person will not be able to be motivated by providing value for others while consistently maintaining that thought pattern of fear.

Once a person intellectually recognises the benefits of the being motivated by providing value for others they have to gather enough faith to make the leap from being motivated by security.

I am yet to discover a case where being motivated by security creates a better and more fulfilling life than one motivated by providing value for others. This is one of the key reasons why I believe this theory to be so powerful.

So have a look at your own goals. Why is it that you want those goals? Could the reasons for wanting your goals link with how quickly and efficiently you are acting to achieve them?