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CronoDAS comments on Pain and gain motivation - Less Wrong
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I am confused as to how this is possible, and how the second follows from the first. If I only work to put food on the table, and I stop worrying about putting food on the table, how does that help me to get my work done, instead of spending all day playing World of Warcraft until I starve to death?
Stop right there -- the first error is in the word "only".
If you are operating under negative motivation, it tends to appear as though that negative motivation is the only thing keeping you going, because negative motivation suppresses awareness of positive motivation. There are actually dozens of possible positive motivations you could have for working.
Which brings me to the second error -- that the motivation is really to "put food on the table", vs. say, "not starve". Note, however, that you could also be putting food on the table because you like eating better than not-eating. ;-)
IOW, for every possible negative motivation there is generally a plethora of alternative positive motivations available, all of which will bring anticipated pleasure, in place of the anticipated absence of pain that's all a negative motivation can provide you with.
And last, but not least, this also means that you are probably not working only to "put food on the table". Unless you have personal experience of starvation being linked to not working, you're unlikely to have a Safety link to working (other than one instilled by your parents scaring you as a kid). Most people's choice to work is actually Status or Affiliation driven, whether or not they're aware of it.
[Important note: I am not saying people work because they get status or affiliation from it -- though that's possible -- but rather, that most people have been taught that a person who doesn't work is low-class (Status) or unworthy/inadequate (Affiliation).]
Yeah... I think I get it, at least somewhat. But what if you think that you have stronger positive motivations to do something else, say, World of Warcraft?
Well, I was using "put food on the table" in the usual metaphorical sense. (And if I could deal with the whole "not being hungry" thing without actually eating, I would; I don't get all that much pleasure from food.)
In terms of my own situation, though, I'm not working...
You say you have clients. How do I sign up?
Motivation is measured in feeling, not thinking. Thinking about what feelings you might or might not have is like dancing about architecture -- it might be entertaining, but it's not very informative. ;-)
You're only assuming that it's a positive motivation, and in your shoes (if I understand your situation correctly) it's not a great assumption, even if the vast majority of Warcraft players are primarily positively-motivated.
Myself, I got bored with WoW after a couple of months, so I can't speak for the WoW players out there.
(More relevant comments will come later, after I think of some.)
I wasn't talking about myself in particular there. I was trying to be more abstract.
Okay, here's something.
When I was in college, I often had something that I wanted to be doing, but I had all that damn homework to do. When I sat down to do my homework, all I could think about was how awful it was and how much I'd rather be doing something else. But if I went and did something else, I had to deal with having a lot of homework to do and not doing it. I eventually found what turned out to be a satisfactory way to resolve the dilemma.
I dropped the course, and felt very relieved afterward.
As I've mentioned before, I can honestly say that I only graduated because of my parents' pressure. If I dropped out of college after my second or third year, I think I could have avoided a lot of unnecessary suffering; so far, the only real benefit I've gotten from my college degree has been that my parents are satisfied with the amount of education I have.
So, I'm not entirely clear, but I get the impression you're presenting this as an example of something that you wouldn't do if you dropped the negative motivation for it.... and implying that this is somehow bad.
If so, then I'd point out that if indeed the only positive result you got from your degree is your relief with your parents' satisfaction, then you could've gotten that result a lot easier and quicker by deleting your brain's evaluation of their dissatisfaction as a SASS threat.
FWIW, both I and my clients have passed through periods that I've tongue-in-cheekly called, "the dark night of the soul" -- a period where you've removed one or more major negative motivations, and then realize you have no idea WTF you're doing with your life or want to do with it in the future.
However, a period like this is not the result of having no negative motivation - it's the result of having removed only one level of negative motivation, without reaching your fundamental values or criteria yet. (That is, you no longer have negative motivation, but you're still judging your life by negative criteria.)
Once you get the criteria as well as the motivation, things start to turn around, and you begin (re)discovering all the things you actually like about life and the world. One of the key issues for me was realizing that I cannot "figure out" or "solve" what I want. (As I said, thinking about feelings is like dancing about architecture.)
What I've realized is that I have to actually ask myself what I already want, and that when I ask that question, there are answers, so long as I do NOT engage in trying to figure out what I should want, or what would "make me happy", or any other sort of goal-oriented process.
Fundamentally, positive motivation is not something that you use in order to get something else. As long as you treat it as a tool to get yourself to do something, you're still stuck in the same box -- your real motivation at that point is whatever problem you're trying to solve by adding positive motivation.
Having your parents tell you "If we are sufficiently dissatisfied, you'll be homeless" is kind of scary. :(
Getting a college degree is supposed to be of great benefit - and if I had gone on to have a career as an engineer or programmer or something, it would have been. And at least I have the social status associated with "college graduate" instead of "college dropout".
That sounds like me right now.
I feel like I ought to do something impressive with my life. Many of the other students in my high school thought I was some kind of super-genius who was going to end up as the next Bill Gates or something, and I feel that, by not living up to my potential, as it were, it would be like I'm letting them down. I have a fantasy that I go to sleep one day, spend the next ten to fifteen years as a philosophical zombie, and become consciousness after having done something impressive enough that I can retire and not worry about having to do anything else. (Like in those mediocre movies "13 Going on 30" and "Click".) I'm embarrassed whenever someone asks me what I do for a living, and ashamed that I'm . I want to be respected, but I'm not willing to do what it takes to earn that respect in either the most common manner (become an employee) or the next most common manner (become an entrepreneur). And I'm worried about what will happen when my parents get too old to support me. (I'm 27, and they're both 61.) I've tried my best to deal with this by simply not caring about what happens to me in the future, but that's hard, and eventually the future happens anyway.
I think there should have been a paragraph break in there somewhere. :(
What pushes you forward, holds you back. That is, it is precisely this feeling of "ought" that is the problem.
When you have an ought or a should, it is generally shorthand for "something bad will happen if I don't". The something bad is not expressed, because then whenever you comply with your "should" you appear more "moral" to your compatriots, than if you are "merely" complying out of duress.
It's essential to identify the precise nature of the unconsciously-represented threat (which is where SASS comes in), and to flip it around to the positive form of that need.
And are you afraid they won't like you, or won't respect you?
Don't analyze - just feel what it's like to let them down... is it more like being lonely and rejected, or ashamed and humiliated? Are you a less-good person for doing this, a less-important person, or something else?
In this context, ashamed and humiliated.
Ok, Status then. What would it be like if your parents were proud of you, regardless of whether you ever accomplished anything or not? (Again, don't think... just ask the question and feel the answer.)