motivation hacking
cuz motivation ain't magic
why can't it just be summer forever?
i don't get all the hype around fall － everything's wet, gray and dirty.
"but tea and sitting on the couch"
fuck you and your brown leaf obsession,
the couch is available year round.
i can hear the rain knocking on my window,
reminding me that i gotta spend another day inside.
the wind howling "fuck youuuu".
ugh
i didn't expect seasonal depression to hit before fall even started.
my toes, if i still have them, are already tanking my core temperature.
like ice melting, but dripping upwards, freezing me to the bone.
it's only day one,
i got another 272 to go,
i would rather just freeze to death right now.
okay let's stop being a whiny lil bitch
motivation is tricky.
describing it as the wind is almost perfect.
in the moment you can't control it,
but long term it's definitely controllable.
unlike the wind, you can control the strength.
in the moment you'll have to use willpower －
but that isn't sustainable.
motivation is built up from two parts.
if you want, you can break it down to a formula.
not exact enough for the math nerds,
but enough to use it.
motivation level = general motivation + attractiveness of options
general motivation is your baseline, your essential life force.
you know what it feels like to be fit, alert, fulfilled yet slightly hungry.
if you don't eat garbage, move your body & have a solid mindset －
you're probably above average here.
attractiveness of options is how you feel about what you got.
this is heavily influenced by your recent activities & personality.
if you scrolled TikTok for 3.5 hours － books'll feel like math summer camp.
so if you want to increase motivation you've got two levers to pull.
either you work on your health, relationships & worldview －
or you look for options that excite you more.
both increase motivation.
the first takes ages. the second is temporary.
if only there was a third…
the options route
the alarm clock came too soon today.
you wanted a head start, but your eyelids pull even your head down.
bogged down by the weight of your existence － you give up.
parting ways with consciousness for a few more hours.
when you do finally wake up nothing inspires you.
even going back to sleep seems like a chore.
so you decide to go the external route － find a spark.
naturally all the highly engaging stuff is what you gravitate to.
general motivation is low, so you compensate with your surroundings.
movies, video games, ice-cream,
the same short you've seen a thousand times,
but now it has subtitles and Grand Theft Auto footage
of a guy drifting a lime green subaru playing under it.
this is a never-ending battle that only brings more loss.
it stimulates addiction, narrowing the scope of what you enjoy.
naturally your general motivation drops, making you even more reliant.
every choice gains weight.
every wait grows longer.
every idea loses spark.
the more you scratch, the itchier you get.
you scratch until you bleed, bleed until it heals.
just for the healing to bring back the itch.
it never ends.
it's often the most direct approach that leads people astray.
if you want to stay motivated this is a horrible strategy.
you'll keep chasing highs, making them more elusive.
this is clearly a dead end.
reverse that shit,
let's go left.
the general approach
this is miles better than the previous one.
you realized that chasing stimulation doesn't work.
so you work on your general motivation.
but how?
in general, a healthy person is a motivated person.
but what does it mean to be healthy?
the first part is the physical － obvious stuff.
you sleep 8 hours, eat a clean diet & exercise.
this is your foundation.
you can't live on just a foundation alone though.
as soon as it starts raining, you get wet.
there's more building to be done.
the next layer is mental health.
this layer is made up of two parts:
how you operate in the now － aka real time.
and how you process what happened － aka past time.
so real time is about now.
your mind needs stillness and focus to thrive.
basically this means immersing in the moment.
how?
just fucking allow yourself for once.
when you've got a quiet or boring moment, don't panic.
living in the moment is actually your default mode.
your mind'll try to push for stimulation with anxiety,
but if you accept your feelings － it fades quickly.
stop taking your earbuds with you when you travel.
stop looking at your phone whenever you have to wait.
stop repeating the same reasons for and against going to that party,
if you're already waiting for your friends to pick you up.
life naturally gives you these moments of stillness.
use them.
if you wanna go the extra mile, start meditating.
your mind distracts with notifications too － mostly bullshit.
meditation will allow you to catch yourself before opening them.
your life is in the now, don't let anything rob you of that.
so what about past time?
this is emotional work.
over the years impactful moments get stored inside you.
as long as you don't process these, they'll keep coming back.
so whenever you feel a nasty emotion, sit with it.
you'll automatically digest it, breaking it down for good.
as soon as you push it away, you lose.
more and more will build up, only making life harder.
you think you're escaping, but you're just building more walls.
sitting with it might not be enough though.
some emotions you've had on replay for so long,
the record player got stuck in a groove,
digging itself deeper into it each time.
this emotion has become part of your belief system.
one painful moment created a story.
that same story got replayed thousands of times.
at some point you see everything as evidence.
until it overlays every aspect of your life.
it's no longer a lens.
it's reality.
whether it's about your personality, the world or life.
any belief you have should be filtered before repeating.
ask yourself what effect believing something has on you.
is the effect desired? keep repeating that shit.
is it not? yeet that thing out the window ASAP.
you get rid of bad beliefs by repeating the opposite.
whenever it comes up, spot it, break it down & reverse it.
meditation can help you stay aware enough to do so.
when the thought: "i suck a flirting" comes up － pause.
realize it's just past trauma talking, being overly protective.
recognize that each time you act despite the weight － you get stronger.
now proceed and go tell them they remind you of your grandma.
they'll probably laugh, continue or get weirded out.
it doesn't matter, you've already gained power.
eventually you'll come up with a better line.
some people keep toxic beliefs to be "realistic".
these people are either ignorant or extremely arrogant.
nobody knows absolute truth, humans can only assume.
building logical arguments on top of them doesn't make it real.
so why the fuck would you assume something that hurts you?
in short, your general motivation is built from these pillars
sleep, exercise & nutrition
stillness & focus
facing your feelings
restructuring beliefs
building general motivation is a long term process.
it can take years to get all of these down, especially the beliefs.
so don't expect results right away, this is long-term investing.
there's a third route, but it's mostly dirt.
the rough terrain isn't for the faint of heart.
if you think you've got what it takes, pack up.
you're in for a ride.
hacking motivation
so you need results fast, but you don't wanna fuck your life up.
you're investing in general motivation, but that'll pay later.
how do you get motivation NOW?
now might be too much to ask, but i can offer you same week.
give me a few days and i promise you'll feel more motivation.
this approach is gonna fucking suck on the first attempts.
but once you get it, you'll feel like you're cheating.
WARNING: before we proceed i do need to warn you.
when you master this technique, people around you change.
everyone around you will start feeling like a lazy pussy bitch.
so if you like your peers, beware, you might stop respecting them.
you've walked the first path and you wish you never did.
you're still walking the second, but the rainbow is beyond the horizon.
to make use of the third path i have to reveal a hidden metric.
the hidden variable
to get a clear picture of this hidden metric, let's compare motivation to jumping.
the higher your motivation, the more your jump resembles MJ's, Kobe's, or LeBron's
the activation level, our hidden metric, decides the height of the basket.
if motivation is high enough, you can score － motivation is working.
in the NBA all baskets are the same height － that's where our comparison breaks.
each person has a different activation level, a different threshold for feeling ready.
you might have great general motivation with a wide range of options,
if your basket is out of reach － you ain't scoring.
this is why even wealthy, well developed people can feel demotivated.
you might be wondering how they got there if their basket was too high.
the answer is that it wasn't always like that － and that's great news for us.
it means our activation level is adjustable.
do you realize how powerful this is?
the first two routes were about jumping as high as Jordan to score.
the third literally allows you to lower the rim to kiddy height.
even your grandma's bad ankles got enough spring in 'em to dunk that shit.
it's effectively the same as boosting your general AND the options at the same time.
you can feel just as motivated as if you'd done years of building up the general.
on some jeff bezos x mike tyson type shit.
before we can lower it though,
we need to understand why it's so high.
understanding activation
the level of motivation needed for it to activate depends on three factors.
addiction to highlights (stimulation threshold):
if you the type to binge watch highlights, full matches become boring.
a big part of Kobe's success was doing boring shit A LOT.
Kobe's threshold was very low － he loved the grind.
benchwarmers fatigue (perceived effort):
how you go into each game can determine your success.
if you feel like scoring is too hard, you won't give it your all.
lucky for you － the idea of effort is always heavier than the effort itself.
you'll see why soon enough.
the championship game (negative consequence):
raising the stakes can turn good players into legends.
motivation comes from goals, but also from avoiding losses.
the more you got to lose, the more you'll fight to keep it.
now that we know the ingredients,
let's get cookin'.
lowering the rim
so you wanna be motivated right?
whether that's for writing, training, studying or just in general.
this protocol just takes 3 steps you'll follow for 7 days.
let's prepare them.
the flinch
to prepare this step you need to get nice and comfortable.
even better if you wait until you're in a super lazy mood.
maybe scroll for a few hours to speed things up.
does your body feel heavy already?
even things you enjoy feel like a chore now?
great, that means you're ready to get started.
take the next 15 minutes to brainstorm the following:
what activities seem like fucking hell right now?
what makes lazy-you severely cringe of disgust?
try to stick to useful/healthy things.
a long run?
an ice cold shower?
small talk with strangers?
pick the one that makes your soul sink the most.
you'll need it later.
the reminder
now that you're in that lazy state, let's use it a lil' longer.
i need you to time travel to your laziest moment in life.
one of those days you did absolutely nothing
and felt like shit.
pick the worst one and relive that feeling.
take out a notepad and vividly describe that experience.
from the weight of every decision, to that light grease on your fingers.
really dig into how disgusting you felt.
contrast it with your proud moments,
to see how shit it really is.
now you got everything you need to get started.
let's start hacking motivation.
the hack
it's incredibly simple.
for the next week you're gonna follow 3 steps.
start your day with the flinch
read your reminder with feeling
engage in the activity you want motivation for
that's it.
i promise you'll see results almost immediately.
your brain needs some more convincing first though.
i get it － it's still trying to escape the flinch.
so let me explain why this works.
the flinch is where the magic happens.
you're about to do it and you desperately wanna escape.
merely thinking about the flinch makes your brain crawl back.
this means your motivation level is in the negative.
you're literally motivated to avoid it.
your brain goes:
"this shit boutta be all effort no stimulation, fuck this".
but the idea of effort is always heavier than the effort itself.
so when you get down to doing, your brain is shocked.
it's surprised to see it wasn't that bad after all, so it recalibrates.
it underestimated stimulation and overestimated effort.
that means highlight addiction & benchwarmers fatigue drop to the floor.
and i didn't even mention the contrast this activity got with the rest of life.
begin your day climbing a mountain, and all other challenges will be hills in comparison.
and what's the biggest hill of all? the general route.
the third route isn't separate, it's the feedback loop fueling all paths.
you could be done here, but there's more.
your life is already more stimulating and easier,
so your reminder is just icing on the cake.
feeling those negative consequences builds even more contrast.
you're basically making your desired life more attractive.
even a jab to the gut feels good if the alternative is a bullet.
so in two simple steps you've
made your life more exciting
turned every obstacle into a stepping stone
fallen in love with your desired life even more.
i call this protocol "choose your own discomfort".
in life there's no way to escape discomfort.
trust me, i've tried － way too often.
when you try avoiding it.
it'll just boomerang back way harder.
you thought working out was hard?
try type 2 diabetes, depression & dying alone.
you get the logic.
either you choose your discomfort － or life does.
and life hits way harder than you ever could.
"recognize that each time you act despite the weight － you get stronger.
now proceed and go tell them they remind you of your grandma."
this shit made me chuckle, good reads as always bro