When I was a young adolescent (as opposed to an old adolescent), I could not keep a girlfriend. And it was explained to me that it wasn’t because I was a jerk or had perpetual bad breath. It was, because, as it was explained to me, women were fickle. This was the sage observation of a slightly older adolescent, who I think had just learned the definition of the word “fickle.” New to the word myself, I asked its meaning. I was told it meant the whimsical nature of the average-general run-of-the-mill woman’s interests, loyalty, and, in particular, affection, which are ever and constantly changing. I… didn’t quite grasp that. Perhaps maybe he was talking about my ever-changing taste buds. Truthfully, I didn’t know enough about girls to know if he was wrong or right. And in my lifetime, I think I’ve been more fickle than the average-general run-of-the-mill woman, if such a person exists.
From what I understand, the word fickle does mean to change frequently, particularly one’s affections, loyalties, and/or interests. Now, in my lifetime, I have determined a much more fickle thing than women; and that thing is… lights please… motivation. Personally, I can’t seem to keep it. I struggle—I mean I really really struggle—to find a consistency in having motivation, being motivated, or staying motivated. I find it most difficult to finish what I start and achieve my goal. Most. Most. Difficult.
And I hate that. Hate. Hate. Hate it.
I am trying to figure it out. So here is what I have figured so far:
Motivation is fickle, because feelings are momentary (which they are meant to be), but when we treat our feelings like they should fire off a motivation, things start to go awry. First, motivation should be by choice, not by feeling. When we wait for a feeling to motivate, we start to manufacture (at least try to manufacture) feelings. Problem is, we can’t manufacture a feeling. We can engineer a state, but not a feeling (but that’s stuff for another article, so stay tuned); in trying to engineer a feeling, we cause a lot of chaos in us and around us. Lots. Of chaos. Loads of it. I mean, loads and loads and loads and… need I say more? We should not try to manufacture a feeling in order to make ourselves or keep ourselves motivated. Feelings are a part of our emotional information system that is meant for discernment in making choices; they are not and should not be linked directly to those choices. Resolutions are a type of choice; specifically, they are sustainable choices. The key to their sustainability is not in manufacturing nor maintaining any type of emotional experience—it’s just not dependable enough to reach the end of a sustainable choice.
Way too often we treat emotions as motivation, which I think contributes to the entire fickle factor. Way too often, when we feel something, we immediately act on it without discernment, in order to feel better, so all of our emotional system gets stuck in the rut of staying on the up-side which leaves nothing for the realm of remembering, and it is in the remembering that we stay in touch with our real want which in turn fires our motivational system (deep breath, long sentence). I know, I know—run that by me again. Yes, this is going to need lots of unpacking, because this is a different paradigm—a completely different paradigm for considering our choices, for processing our feelings, and for harnessing ongoing motivation (more articles on this later). Because feelings bounce, motivation toward a resolution based on feelings cannot help but to be fickle, to change frequently. Motivation needs something far more consistent than a feeling.
So let us ask this simplified question: what is the real power to seeing it through, to staying motivated for a resolution to be fulfilled? This might sound overly simplistic, and, in fact, really stupid, and I mentioned it a moment ago. It’s possible, quite possible, that the key to motivation is in… lights please… remembering the feeling.
Now remembering the feeling is not about the proverbial “playing angry” (I hate it when coaches suggest that—totally charley-horses the whole purpose of anger, and the emotional system—it’s that chaos thing); but I kind of am talking about “playing angry.” But I’m talking more about awareness than intention (playing angry is more about playing aggressive with fire in the belly, yet it is easier to take the short cut and say “play angry” than “play aggressive with fire in the belly”; playing angry leads us then down the path to where hot lava anger comes out in all situations that require intentional movement in the presence of injustice, imbalance, or unfairness, and hot lava tends to make those situations much worse than a simple informed objective approach we could have and should have if it hadn’t been reinforced a million times by our coaches saying “play angry”—sorry). Sheesh, Paul, stay on point, which is precisely why it is sooooo hard to stay motivated, because it is hard to stay on point, to stay pointed in a single direction when the terrain keeps shifting up and down and all round like an earthquake while you are walking on a treadmill—ouch! It is hard to stay focused when what you are focused on shifts and new things keep popping up. Argh, double argh, and triple argh! Hence, I’m not fickle; the whole system and world and universe, internal and out, is fickle! Drives. Me. Nuts! Like playing angry! Or writing angry! Quadruple argh! (deep breath)
So, back to the key to motivation—remembering. Let’s take the lights down just a little bit to focus on this: a feeling shows up when our system detects the presence or the possibility of something in the vicinity, a need or a particular reality. If I have trained myself to “search my feelings” and discern the need or reality that the feeling is representing, then remembering the need or reality keeps me on point. When I can remember what it felt like when what went wrong went wrong, and keep that memory in the center of my movement, I can “stay on target” with my motivation until the resolution is complete. Remembering is the key, because in remembering, I am staying focused on my want and choosing by discipline to do what is wanted. That’s not necessarily a selfish want, nor a whimmed want (like my desire for a soda or for bacon), but a want based on values, importance, goodness, need, rightness, helpfulness, design, supposed-to-ness—things that say something should be done because it makes the world a better place. It is the want that more than likely had been hanging around for a while and been trying to get our attention, and so we chose it at some point and resolved that this thing should be done and by golly by gum I’m going to do it. By gum by golly. Finally. Do it. Until it is complete. In doing so, I am using choice and discipline to achieve the important thing for the world, and for myself and those important to me, and not waiting on a feeling to motivate, which I said before is a total charley-horse of the emotional system, and a massive chaos-maker. Motivation and achieving resolution does more to reduce if not eliminate chaos than it does to stir it up. Remembering is staying in touch with the “why”—why I’m doing this and where I’ve been and what this will achieve and how that will be good and helpful and necessary.
Ok, lights please… And that’s a good thing—achieving a thing resolved. It is a good thing in so many ways and on sooooo many levels. It exceeds the average-general-run-of-the-mill thing, if average-general-run-of-the-mill even exists.
So that’s what I’ve figured so far.
I think.
Yeah, I think that’s right.
Let’s go with that.
Nope, we’re gonna need more. Ok, I’ll be in touch.
Lights off.
Paul Johnson is a professionally licensed marriage and family therapist and a professionally licensed counselor at LifePractical Counseling in Birmingham AL.
by Paul Johnson, LMFT, LPC
August 2021, Birmingham, AL
Photo by Javier Allegue Barros on Unsplash