Character analysis is a crucial aspect of literature, focusing on the unique makeup of characters in a story. It involves closely examining a character’s traits, motivations, development, and their motivations. Character motivation is the reason behind a character’s behaviors and actions in a given scene or throughout a story. Motivations can be intrinsic needs or external needs and relate to various aspects of a character’s life.
To craft a character’s motivation, it is essential to understand their background, align them with the four foundations of interiority, and focus on their inner struggles that they must overcome. Intrinsic motivations come from within, like a character’s personal beliefs, values, desires, and emotions. Examples of intrinsic motivation include achievement, curiosity, fear fulfillment, honor, pleasure, power, purpose, acceptance of oneself, forgiveness for past mistakes, and chasing inner fulfillment.
External motivation is driven by factors outside of the character’s control, while internal motivation comes from a choice they have made. To create complex and relatable characters, it is essential to examine the basic plot and character, build the character with the plot in mind, and examine the character’s fears. By combining external goals with internal desires, writers can create complex and relatable characters that drive the story forward.
In summary, character analysis is a key part of studying literature, focusing on the unique makeup of characters in a story. By understanding a character’s background, aligning motivations with the four foundations of interiority, and combining external goals with internal desires, writers can create compelling and dynamic characters that drive the story forward.
📹 Neuroscientist: “This Simple Skill Will Keep You Motivated” | Andrew Huberman
Dr. Andrew Huberman shares a practical daily protocol to help regulate your dopamine levels and achieve more motivation and …
What are the three internal motivators?
Intrinsic motivation is based on autonomy, purpose, and mastery, allowing individuals to act independently, feel their efforts matter, and gain satisfaction from becoming more skilled. It differs from extrinsic motivation, which involves behavior for external rewards or punishment. This article is based on intrinsic motivation, as readers interested in psychology are likely to read it to learn more about motivation.
What are internal motivations examples?
Internal motivation involves a person engaging in an activity for its own sake without external rewards, such as a hobby. It can stem from feelings, thoughts, values, and goals. External motivation, on the other hand, is driven by external factors like money or coercion, often influenced by parents, coworkers, friends, or siblings. It is often measured in terms of salary, promotions, grades, praise, and punishment. Motivation can be categorized into two dimensions: the underlying intention and the motivation itself, which can range from negative to positive.
What is an example of a character’s internal goal?
The internalization of specific goals, such as self-acceptance in romantic narratives, courage in fantasy, science fiction, and thriller contexts, as well as the pursuit of happiness and peace in narrative nonfiction, are essential for a story’s overall success. In the absence of character goals, readers may experience a lack of support and motivation, which can diminish their engagement with the narrative.
How do you identify internal motivation?
Internal motivation refers to tasks that are completed out of one’s own volition, whereas external motivation pertains to tasks that are undertaken in response to external pressures or incentives.
How to find a character’s motivation?
To find character motivation, first, build out their backstory, which explains why someone is where they are today. Outline their goals and dreams, and take note of their limitations. Without knowing character motivation, the actions behind their decisions become meaningless or boring. For example, a former businesswoman traveling across the country in a caravan or a father taking a substitute teacher job at his children’s rival school might not be interesting to watch or read.
The narrative may not be mediocre or cliche, but it’s important to understand the motivation behind the decisions of characters to avoid feeling upset or unhappy. Instead, the goal should be to make the story interesting and engaging, rather than leaving the audience feeling unsatisfied or uninterested. This approach helps to create a more engaging and engaging story.
What is internal character motivation?
Internal motivations are character choices, while external motivations are driven by external factors. Internal motivations are typically higher up the hierarchy of needs, such as growth, love, morals, and self-worth, while external motivations are lower, like survival, peer pressure, and acceptance. These motivations can conflict and push a character forward. To create a character’s motivation, it is crucial to ensure it is believable, allowing for flaws, mistakes, and regrets. Motivations should be fluid and adaptable to changing situations.
How to analyze character motivations?
To create a compelling story, it’s essential to test characters in normal situations and introduce surprise to understand their motivations. Need and necessity are powerful motivators that generate friction and energy. These motivations can include survival, saving, protecting, or changing things for the better.
Determining a character’s goal in relation to the plot is crucial, as it’s determined by the genre. For example, a detective’s rational motivation is to find the murderer, while Humbert Humbert’s goal is to avoid detection and seduce Lolita.
There are various techniques to develop a powerful character, and as you continue writing, you’ll find your own. Some writers prefer to create detailed biographies or dossiers for each character, detailing every aspect of their life, while others prefer to let the story shape the characters.
How do you analyze motivation?
Motivation is a crucial aspect of human behavior, often measured through various tools such as motivation assessments, scales, and questionnaires. These assessments can be cognitive, affective, behavioral, or physiological. They can also be compared to previous or subsequent levels of motivation or motivation in different goal states, such as salient versus non-salient goals. For instance, a membership card might increase motivation to exercise now, compared to someone who did not receive the same. Therefore, motivation is a complex and multifaceted concept.
What are the three 3 primary sources of internal motivation?
Intrinsic motivation is based on autonomy, purpose, and mastery, allowing individuals to act independently, feel their efforts matter, and gain satisfaction from becoming more skilled. It differs from extrinsic motivation, which involves behavior for external rewards or punishment. This article is based on intrinsic motivation, as readers interested in psychology are likely to read it to learn more about motivation.
How do you teach internal motivation?
Intrinsic motivation in students can be boosted by empowering them with a sense of conscious choice, setting a greater goal, reinventing the system of rewards, forgetting negative motivation, boosting self-esteem, providing honest feedback, and encouraging collaboration. Gamification has been used by learning experts and business coaches to improve student/employee engagement and unlock hidden potentials. However, there is a lack of intrinsic motivation that doesn’t require badges, certificates of achievement, or other perks.
To boost intrinsic motivation, teachers should empower students with a sense of choice, allowing them to make their own decisions and demonstrate commitment to their chosen sciences. This approach can help retain students’ interest without the need for badges or perks.
How can you infer a character’s motivation?
Inferring a character’s motivation entails identifying a particular thought, emotion, or action, analyzing the author’s or other sources’ statements about the character, and citing evidence within the text to explain why the character might act in a specific manner.
📹 “This is how i organize my thoughts and my knowledge” – Jordan Peterson
I too am a neuroscientist and agree. Pianists who enjoy practicing, dancers who enjoy moving new ways, scientists and mathematicians who are obsessed with sketching formulae and ideas on whiteboards and papers and computers… drivers who drive across the country… Kids on bikes… It is the journey, not the destination, that is the reward.
As a creative type I can relate to this. When I was a child/teenager I used to write, draw and make music purely for the joy of it, but as I got older I started focusing too much on the end goal of earning a living from my art, and then I didn’t enjoy myself anymore. I want to start making art for fun again. I hope someone helped those children to enjoy drawing again after they’d finished the study, otherwise that would be a pretty unethical way to gather scientific data.
🎯 Key Takeaways for quick navigation: 00:00 🏆 Focusing solely on the end goal or reward can undermine the pleasure derived from the effort itself. 01:50 🧠 Cultivating a growth mindset involves finding pleasure in effort and striving, rather than just pursuing external rewards. 03:56 ☕ Focusing only on the end goal makes the process more painful and less efficient. 05:32 💪 In moments of intense friction, tell yourself that the pain will lead to increased dopamine release and that you’re doing it because you love it. 06:29 🧬 Accessing pleasure from effort is a powerful aspect of dopamine, and it’s accessible to everyone. Avoid spiking dopamine before or after effort; learn to find pleasure in the effort itself. Made with HARPA AI
Absolutely perfect description of what my care was like for my wife with dementia. After the worst days, I felt more relaxed when that day was done. And on and on for 5 years. My biggest mistake was looking forward to when she would pass in the last 4 months, she passed 3/19/2023. Looking forward to her no longer suffering, me no longer suffering. The freedom that would return, the weight of 24/7 care would be gone. HUGE mistake. When she passed, I was so lost, so down. I did things that were fun only to find myself empty right after doing those things. Fun outdoor things too. I have been recovering slowly from that, and now, with your explanation, I feel so much lighter. It will be ok. I will move along with this load. The carrying of the load makes it better. The load being triggers of memories, occasional look backs at the last 5 years. Much easier to deal with now.💖
Here’s another tip: just do one small thing as part of a large project. The next day do another small part of the project. If you’re writing a book, just do one or two paragraphs of your next chapter. That leads you on. You feel so good just having done a small thing you can’t wait to get back to it. And that leads you into doing more each time, to the finish line. Kind of like eating a small bite of chocolate every day, teasing your palate.
Makes sense. In my younger days I was at the top of my field in masonry construction. Laying heavy concrete block all day long in the hot South Florida summers is extremely strenuous work, and takes a lot out of you, but I loved it. It never bothered me that I laid twice as many block as the guy next to me who got paid the same or more than me. The rewards came later when I started my own company, but I didn’t do it just for the money, it just made the most sense. By God’s grace I ended up doing well, and am semi-retired, and can still do it when I need too, but I do it now because I still enjoy it, not because I need the money. It certainly makes all the struggles and problems of your job a lot easier when you do it because you enjoy it and not just for a paycheck. I never could stand working around people like that very long, they didn’t last long on my job, sometimes only a few hours.
As a kid, I panicked when we had to do school tests. Couldn’t remember a thing. A very understanding teacher told me then that she knew how much I really knew and that I should not let the bad grades get me down. She encouraged me to follow my own assessment of how well I know a subject. That defined my life. I stopped learning for grades and started to enjoy learning so much more. Yes, it was difficult, but that also was the joy of it. It became a good challenge and a reward in itself. I am close to retirement now, and I had and still have a very successful, satisfying and happy work life. I’ve never stopped learning, and I am looking forward to new challenges in my retirement.
What’s wild is that I was able to do this for exercise easily. I love working out, I love the pain, I love pushing my body to see what it can do. But I got all messed up when it comes to my creative stuff once I started trying to hit a goal. I never thought I’d have to reteach myself how to love my hobbies, but this helped reframe it so I think I can get out of the hole
That’s what many nice people can’t understand. Why i don’t sell my crocheted items, they describe them as very unique and that i am skilled or gifted. I make my pieces and give them away. It makes me feel happy to see the joyful reaction on the receivers’ faces. But i do get a great benefit out of that, i enjoy the activity itself, sitting calming after work, with my cat, making new art. I realized that the real gift people are talking about is not the skill, but the actual enjoyment of the activity is the blessing. If i start taking orders and getting paid monetarily, i will lose a lot more, I’ll lose the calming, peaceful, and enjoyment i get from creating my art and giving it away. I do understand, Dr. huberman. Thank you for the wonderful knowledge you share all the time.
Your effort in anything is always 100% owned by you. Rewards and accomplishments seldom are, and I find it sad that society uses them to manipulate us into thinking we are better than one another in some way. So… may you all find the things that bring you joy, and throw yourself into the effort of doing them for no reason other than “just because”.
In my experience, ‘telling’ myself the effort is the reward does NOT work. What works is LISTENING to whatever it is inside me that is telling me how pleasurable the effort is. I don’t know what it is that’s doing that ‘talking’ but it’s different from the conscious me trying to impose my will on it and it’s not at all the reward system. It’s just a sort of listening, like ‘oh, that’s right, now I remember, this activity is a blast! (even if it’s strenuous.)’ Thank you for this article. It helped me focus my thoughts on this issue. Definitely subscribing.
I learned this but wasn’t able to put it in to words until I saw this. I went on a hike one weekend and did a new trail that I thought would only be slightly more challenging than I’d done before. It was a good amount more difficult than I did before. While hiking I began to wish I was done with the hike and back in my air conditioned car. I told myself “the only way back to my car is through the woods.” Then I realized that was the point of going on a hike in the first place. It made the rest of the hike enjoyable despite the difficulty.
Your subject is very informative. I had always worked under the external reward system and I attest to the fact that I went to the process not enjoying it. There was stress and struggle on my way to the reward that after getting the reward, i did not have the least motivation to go through it again. After perusal your lecture, I’ll try to find dopamine in hurdling the challenges of what I’m doing.
The only activity I can relate this to is guitar playing. I started playing the guitar when I was 13 years old. My parents bought a nylon string acoustic guitar for me, and it was difficult to play at first. I took a guitar lesson at a high school summer class. It was really painful to press my fingers on the strings because I had soft finger tips. But I loved the sound of guitars so much, that I endured the pain and kept practicing my lessons. I think I was able to press on the strings hard enough to get a decent sound after about two weeks. After I got over the pain, it was much easier to play open C, E, A, G, and F chords (a lot of beginning guitar students hate to play the open F chord. I guess it’s because you get a double dose of pain on your index finger.). If I practice daily, my fingertips will become hard, and the fretted strings will have a good tone. I’ve spent most of my teen years playing the acoustic guitar. After I graduated from high school, my parents bought an electric guitar for me. Man, that guitar was so easy to play compared to my acoustic! With the amplified sound, I didn’t have to try so hard. I just naturally knew how to get the best tone out of the strings because of all those years of struggling with my acoustic guitar. It was like being let out of a cage.
🎯 Key Takeaways for quick navigation: 00:00 🧠 The Pleasure of Effort and Dopamine – Finding pleasure in effort is the key to accessing dopamine rewards. – Focusing solely on the end goal or reward undermines the process. – Accessing the reward within effort enhances performance and motivation. 03:13 🤔 Growth Mindset and Rewards – Growth mindset involves striving to be better with a focus on effort. – Those with a growth mindset tend to perform well. – Cultivating growth mindset involves accessing rewards from effort. 05:17 💪 Leveraging Pain and Pleasure in Effort – Embrace the pain and friction in effort as a source of pleasure. – It’s about choosing to love and find pleasure in the effort itself. – Separating the reward from the end goal and connecting it to the effort. Made with HARPA AI
I was used to do what i like and effortlessly and eventually it all dropped recently i started to study how to overcome this limitation .thank you and youtube community to bring new perspectives. I was also used to get motivation from outside for the past few years but that didnt satisfied me, and as i switched to internal motivation i got frozen, unable to do anything. suspect its tied with post adolescence where i didnt learn to take risks and appreciate reward, seeking for outside confirmation. All this is taking me already 3 years to really break into pieces and rebuilt again, but i see the light at the end of a tunnel. Not to mention my first stpe was to tak phis activity classes.
Really enjoyed your message. One of my favorite books is Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance by Angela Duckworth. In her book she does mention Carol Dweck along with others. I was drawn to the book after I read a story about an amateur golfer and he focused on the process and not the prize. Having patience was a key ingredient. Thank you again
While I am putting myself through a hard work out, I will just keep repeating to myself “I am choosing this” and “I love this”. During those bouts of extreme pain or exhaustion, I will more emphatically say “I LOVE THIS” and this is AMAZING (and try to smile gleefully for extra ‘pleasure impulse’). I will certainly give this a shot and make the pain experience my goal.
This is helpful because a lot of my stress and anger is derived from me not getting projects such as home improvement projects, to the finish line. I look at unfinished projects or tasks that are put off either due to leisure, the inability to take time off of work, or something else coming up, as failures or in essence, rewards that I am not achieving. If I can rewire my mind to only get the dopamine while working on the project or task, it appears I can stop being so hard on myself for not being that “good little boy” who finished his work.
Pure enjoyment of an activity comes when you become so obsessed with it that you suddenly forget about the end goal and the world around you. When you reach a point where you stop thinking about the salary, grades or scholarship, and that pain of suffering gives you happiness, you’ve embodied the quote “the journey matters more than the destination”
Dope 😏 Thanks 🙂I struggle with COPD, walking up small hill-winded. 65 now. 2023 I pushed myself a bit more each day, extremely focused on breathing, not on my tiring pain. Now I’m able to walk 4k on the trails, in 1.5hr non-stop, with energy left over. Way better than 7 months ago 🤗 ADD BIT EACH DAY!
Great article. One of my favorite quotes is from Joe Frazier: “Champions are not made in the ring, they are merely recognized there.” Learning to spike dopamine during the training the ultimately leads to the win is a brilliant way to derive enjoyment from the very thing that produces victory: hard work, discipline and dedication.
It is the essence of finding Joy in the Journey, the runner’s high -I learned that in my prior degrees in exercise science and while actively bodybuilding, I miss that feeling of my effort in the gym. I have been applying it in my second BS in Equine Science and Management, going back to school after a 17 yrs after an Masters is challenging. I have learned so much more.
“Pleasure from effort” = fun learning. Even the little things such as a new word or a shared discovery. Today I saw a picture of the Crystal Palace in Madrid. Had never heard of it, read about it, saw pictures of it, and there’s this JOY… even if it’s ONLY pixels, in the very activity of exploring, discovery, curiosity.
5:00….Learning to experience the pleasure in the effort, the pain…instead of suffering through it while focus on the end goal. Change your focus to the effort & you will experience so much more pleasure (dopamine)along the way. I love it! My grandson & I were kayaking through a thunderstorm yesterday & we kept looking around at the beauty through the rain, mist above the trees… & it did let up finally, and the end was much sweeter. Now, it’s a treasured memory!❤
I love your podcast and how you explain things. I am an international student in Canada and I have been following you even when I was in my home country. But sometimes it’s hard for me to understand you as English is not my native language. Please consider this point. What you mentioned in this part reminds me of this quote from Atomic Habits by James Clear: You do not rise to the level of your goals, you fall down to the level of your system. It’s a pity that you have not invited him to your podcast. I am sure it will be a great episode. I took great notes from it, Thank you.
I love running because of this. I don’t get a dopamine rush at the end of a run, I get it during the run. When that happens, I perform better and feel great. You don’t usually feel great at the end. Maybe a small sense of accomplishment at the end of a desired distance, but effort is where the fun is at.
Don’t spike dopamine before or after engaging in effort but learn to spike your dopamine from effort itself. The mere pleasure of seeing what you are working on coming together, is the reward itself. The process of doing it, walking the road, performing the dance. Just like everything else in life, it’s not about the destination but the journey. Now I just need to rewire my brain to actually think that way.. but I suppose it is about the journey of rewiring the brain that I should enjoy.
I see a connection with what he’s saying here, and principles of mindset in childbirth I learned from Ina May Gaskin’s books. I have given birth seven times, four in hospital environments, fighting the pain, and three at home, leaning into it. It really is absolutely mind blowing how powerful the difference is.
I don’t know if this is going to be of help for anyone but I’ll say what is it that keeps me motivated when I am in physical pain when doing exercising, or when I am the lab working extra hours instead of pleasantly resting at home. When I find myself doing this kind of activities that indeed require a strong mindset to maintain yourself in a position of discomfort, I actually praise myself when I realize that I am in such position. I literally tell myself when I am working out and I can barely breathe due to the intensity of the workout: ‘girl, you are damn cool you are strong enough to show up and endure this instead of lying on bed’ And then I feel such a rush of self-accomplishment for letting myself go out and find discomfort that it just keeps me going throughout the workout or extra work hours. It is just a feeling of proud for knowing that you are making yourself grow and enjoying the process instead of the goal that is so rewarding. Because, even when we reach our goals, do we stop growing or bettering ourselves? No. And when you fall in love with making yourself your ideal you, you stop focusing on the objective, and you instead focus on the process. That is why I you should praise yourself after every workout, not once you have achieved your ideal body. It is all about the process, guys. I hope this serves as some inspiration!
I’ve fought my way back from 3 joint replacements and now, at 70, when I go to the gym or pool I feel so lucky to be able to move without pain. After the first replacement I wasn’t sure I would walk again, so every physio move was a reward. People wonder how I do it. I do it because I can and it’s fun.
in my early days of working out i started with this mentallity of pursuing a goal. build some muscle to attract girls ofc (14yo), after a month of training i saw the first changes in strenght and weight and i started to love this “building myself” so my focus kinda shifted from attract girls to just be stronger and more muscular for myself and i was still focused on that end goal, i wasnt in love with training itself but with idea of me being stronger and muscular man and then i started to think, If i put more effort into this, that means it will reward me more in the end, so in short period of time i learned to put absolutelly everything into my workout and the results were amazing and in that moment my focus shifted once again from End goal results to doing the work itself because i already knew the end results will be big, so i focused myself on learning new workout combinations, skills, food, and eventually i became in love with doing the work itself, i am now 25 and i think i am addicted to performance at this point. Hopefully this message will help some of you, to see how my brain gradually reprogrammed itself and you can kinda try it too with this paterns.
This is (only/extra) effective if we’re not undermining it with cheap dopamine elsewhere. For me, I had to drop an addiction to weed,drugs, pxrn, first, and then recently caffeine & social media. 1 week into a new exercise routine and working hard on a design project. Fixing years of addiction (and all the trauma from it). 31 y/o.
The “lying to yourself” part can actually be wrapped into “self fulfilling prophecies”, another powerful tool 😳so you start saying “I love this run even though my legs are on fire etc” and overtime the cognitive dissonance between you telling yourself you love running and your body not loving running will eventually align the body to what the mind believes 🤔
I was on my own from age 15, and I was only able to get through grade 9. I didn’t see it as a tragedy…I became autodidactic, and was able to learn more than people who sat in a classroom for years. There was no limit to my education. By the time I was 17 I could, and still can, go to the college or university and pass their entrance exams. I’ve never desired to get any kind of a degree, all I desire is knowledge. And it’s free for the taking! All the books of the world are available…if you can read you can learn, literally anything. In the classroom there are limits, boundaries…the world is my classroom. And anyone I encounter may well be a teacher. Myself included. If you derive joy from learning, you have already achieved something. 🌹
I’ve heard of this mindset before, but it was not explained in this way. Now that I understand the mechanism behind it, I feel I have a better chance of applying that methodology. I just have some questions. How can we tell when we are over doping/ rewarding too much or too often? How much time is suitable to start with as a buffer before and after effort to not associate something pleasurable as a reward for said effort? What does one do in the mean time between something that gives us a fix and the effortful activity? Lastly, and I know this one can be fairly subjective, is there a time of day where it may be preferable to engage in effortful activity? i.e. doing it not long after waking up so there is no time to getting dopamine fixes and therefore make it a bit easier before hand to start getting into this mode of joyful effort?
Great article as always. Anyone who as ever been unhappy with themselves at some point and time physically or mentally has battled this exercise demon. Eventually knowing you’re going to feel better by feeling worse makes you battle harder to feel better, and you feel better about battling harder to overcome. (just dont neglect your dietery needs)
This is great. Instead of saying “I’m doing this because my dopamine level will increase soon” (which is too abstract for some people) you can say “I’m doing this to improve my technique/ grow muscle / understand medieval history better” – instead of win the game/ win the fight/ ace the test. This technique was described in The Power of Double Goal Coaching and has been found in studies to massively increase performance.
This applies long before the goal is in sight. As a young man I suffered a tremendous amount of devastating body shame because I was so skinny. Even my own dad told me I would “never be very big in the chest and shoulders” (which I interpreted to mean that I would never “be a REAL man”). I thought – and believed – it was useless to try. I gave up all hope of ever gaining any muscle or strength, and avoided any attempts completely. I suffered with depression ever after that one curse he had pronounced on my life.. Even after I retired 2 1/2 years ago, it took me two years to get up enough courage to join a gym. Realistically, at age 71 I don’t expect to look like the younger guys I see, but I find that making the effort to be more fit and to progress in my training is motivation in itself to keep going. Part of the reward is that each time I exercise, my brain is refuting the lie I let rule my life for more than 50 years, and that inspires me to work at discovering what my (natural physical) potential ACTUALLY is. The journey is indeed the best part and brings new rewards every day.
I feel like recently I’ve been doing this subconsciously and have made more gains compared to in the past. Since covid i quit the gym and started working out at outdoor gyms and at home. My wife thinks its weird but i actually enjoy training now! I’ve been also training for calisthenics skills where initially the goal was to complete certain skills. In actual fact I’m now more focused on the journey rather than the destination, and i think this is key!
I trained myself to do this from about age 13 with fitness. I was a sick, chubby kid so I decided I was going to beat it through fitness. Because I was sick, it felt awful but I worked out 6 days a week no matter what. Years later that meant the worse the weather, the more I enjoyed going on a trail run, hike, snowshoe, bike ride, etc. I loved it. Then I got badly injured and over the period of a few years I lost all of my motivation for everything. 6 years later, I’m finally getting back into real workouts, kicking my own butt, and getting my enjoyment for life back. Pushing through difficulty in one area definitely brings the joy back in all difficult areas.
I guess I have an athlete’s mindset which is really the same thing. Although I no longer compete, need knees replaced and am a bit old, I absolutely stay motivated in my swimming and cycling by always looking to improve my form to increase speed and improve efficiency. And for what? It really keeps me interested in what I am doing. It is a thrill to go through the water faster and pick up my speed on the bike a small fraction. The only difficulty I face is when I am not able to ride or swim due to pain and I am forced to take time off
I see what you’re saying, but I think “chasing the reward” is what keeps me going. I enjoy powerlifting (and have been doing it for 20+ years), because I like the results, not necessarily the process. Now that I have results, what keeps me going is that I don’t want to lose them. That said, you have to have a lot of patience with yourself for this to work, because you’re not going to hit new PRs every time out.
I found it possible to enjoy gym by perusal some athletes, movie start workout with cool bgms and thinking I’m gonna become like them. I literally look forward to hardest gym excercises and i can do 4 finger pushups, hanging windshield wipers, and all gym excercises with weights, calisthenics hiit in an enjoyable manner.
I’m a mother and I’ve always said that I don’t really care about achievement. With my kids, and myself, what I care about is attitude and effort. It is ALWAYS the process, the journey, the adventure that is important to me. If you put in the effort, have a great attitude and then end up achieving something, great. But achievement alone is hollow.
This information is incredibly healthy. I’m lucky that I get paid to do something with the work its self is the reward. If I thought about the money that I got afterwards being the end goal or any appreciation for it being the target it would be empty. And now the work comes with reprogramming to experience that in other forms of work needed to be done. Much appreciation for giving us a blueprint for doing that.
Thank you, this is awesome. I kind of do this already when I exercise – I do it for the feeling of doing it, and also the feeling of relaxation and lifted mood a little while after. And today I used this mindset to get through only my second day of fasting ever (first time was thirteen years ago.) I really didn’t struggle at all and actually enjoyed the discipline and feeling like my body was getting something it really wanted and needed. I hope to make a weekly habit of this.
Oh thank you! I NEEDED THIS! I have extremely severe ADHD but my hyperactivity is not physical but mental. I so often think about how much I don’t wanna do something and how I wish I could wave a magic wand and be done. Then the tasks multiply and grow at incredible rates and then I become overwhelmed and exhausted before I even begin. Am going to break it down and think of the tiny benefits that only occur as I actively work toward my goal. And I will pay attention to the efforts and work my body and mind do and enjoy them and celebrate the tiny accomplishments as they come. I will be more aware of myself actively moving towards my goal. I see what I need/want to do from a completely different perspective now. So glad I found your website. Now all I have to do is stop pondering in which area of my chaotically cluttered and disorganized life/house do I actually start! I will stop hyper-focusing on creating the perfect and most efficient plan or even strategize about what steps am going to take. I’m going to jump in with both feet and just do it physically instead of running around in circles in my mind. Have no idea if it my take away from your article even relates to what you intended or if it is even remotely similar to the normies’ but I’m grabbing and hanging on to it cause it’s the best idea I’ve heard so far! Thank you!!! ❤❤❤
Terrific concept — getting fulfillment out of the process itself. When I have this approach of valuing the effort from beginning to end, it serves me well, and the outcome is the bonus. After an extraordinary effort, I look back and feel great about leveling up; therefore preparing for the next thing in this process.
Question, as the whole article is based around the wonders of dopamine… How does this translate to someone with diagnosed adhd since I was 6? I’m 21 now and already intellectualised everything about my rewiring etc etc aka found my own way to cope without meds. As known ADHD/ADD adds a deficiency in dopamine receptors. Question is: What is a good way to train the mind to these practices with as much self awareness etc as a neuro divergent person?
– Understanding the pleasure of effort (0:00) – Recognizing the limitations of focusing on rewards (0:28) – Exploring intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivation through experimentation (0:59) – Embracing the principles of growth mindset (2:22) – Accessing rewards from effort and doing (2:53) – Avoiding the focus on end goals to enjoy the process (3:26) – Generating internal rewards for effort (4:26) – Applying self-encouragement during intense effort (5:11) – Avoiding dopamine spikes before and after effort (6:42)
00:00 Working hard is powerful and accessing pleasure from effort is accessible to all 00:57 Rewarding children for drawing reduces their intrinsic motivation to draw 01:52 Striving for growth mindset leads to tremendous performance 02:44 Cultivating a growth mindset is beneficial for performance 03:34 Focusing only on the end goal makes the process less enjoyable and less efficient. 04:23 Focusing on effort leads to internal reward system 05:14 Intense friction can increase dopamine release 06:07 The ability to access pleasure from effort is the most powerful aspect of dopamine. Crafted by Merlin AI.
This one’s interesting in terms of dopamine but sparks the question about the part in the brain that expands when forcing yourself to do something that you didn’t want to do. Those two different things could contradict each other. Maybe cycle’s of falling down and getting back up like a comeback have to take place.🤔 The brain is a strange thing. By telling yourself that the effort is enjoyable it could reduce the expansion of the part of the brain that expands when doing something you don’t want to do so maybe (and I’m not an expert) telling yourself that the grind isn’t what you enjoy but is essential while still praising yourself for the effort and not the result could keep the part of the brain expanding and the flow of dopamine a bit more consistent but how would doing it this way affect the dopamine baseline. Then there’s the question of,if you’re aware of these things will it affect how the brain reacts in these situations as well 🤷. So maybe that’s where a form of repetitive affirmation during this process could influence how the brain reacts 🧐 just an observation but kind of makes sense.
Some time ago I realized (in less if any scientific terms) that children engage with an activity because it intrigues them. The end goal is the involvement itself – the exploration. Children (until influenced by environment, do not appraise their creation, nor do they doubt it. Finally, children do not apply a time line (to a goal). Perhaps this is why adults keep complaining that time seems to run by so much faster than before!
This is what I had to tell myself when in labor, each contraction I told myself the pain was a sign of progression. We associate pain as a negative but in this case my body was doing exactly what it needed to do. And I had to keep myself in that mind state. The moment I thought “I wish this pain would end” it would feel 1000xs worse in an instant.
Don’t tell people, especially your boss that you have this mindset. They will exploit it, and you, using these principles. It has been used against me to screw me out of remuneration of work done on other people’s behalf so often that i can’t get myself into it again like i used to. If an employer or someone says “Hard work is its own reward” they are not employing or teaching growth mindset, they are saying ” I will exploit you and you better be happy with it.”
This is about that part of movies when they accept the challenge of the dance contest, math test, whatever, then shown the accelerated sequence of events with only background music, showing their practice session, sweating, exhausted yet passionate. This is it I guess. And viewers of the movie are getting motivated themselves.
I work my arse off, on purpose. I work in a factory with no AC. I have a college degree and I’m 43 years old. I work this low paying job in the heat because it keeps me fit AF and mentally when I’m driving home I’m actaully at peace with myself. I actaully feel good and sleep good. — FYI, ALL my $$ has gone into BTC/Crypto since last June.
I so needed to see this article!!! Telling yourself you “love the effort” is not necessarily a lie bcuz whatever your conscious mind tells your subconscious mind, it (the subconscious) accepts as true. Accepts as the truth! Your subconscious mind has confirmation bias and no mechanism to challenge what you tell it. Thru repetition, if you tell yourself that “effort is pleasurable” over time you’ll believe it to be true and as a result your body will produce the chemicals (dopamine) that your mind translates as pleasure🥰🥰
As a teacher it is frustrating to see how the idea of external motivation is so embedded in our culture. People insist on it but it’s harmful. We’ve had the research for 50 years at least. Teaching reading is the best example. Kids who like to read are those who choose the books they like to read and are given a lot of choices. Books like Harry Potter are intrinsic motivation.
I think this is true. Ive painted and sketched all my life, for the joy of it. Then my sister commissioned a portrait for one of her clients for money, and more started to follow and I found myself enjoying it less and less. I discovered that the reward actually diminished my creativity and now I’m only creative when I want to be, and the only reward I want is my own satisfaction.
You have to enjoy the process, with no end goal in sight. When I work out, I do so simply because I enjoy doing so. I also play the guitar, and when I am practicing, I do so because I enjoy it. There is no end goal to it. When I am training with my firearms, I do so because I enjoy it. Once again, there is no end goal. I have a saying that I came up with, which is that I enjoy the valleys because I have to go through them to reach the next peak. So, I look forward to the valleys as much as I do the peaks, maybe even more.
Thank you. I’ve been seeking the answer to ‘how’ do I do x thing, but ‘hooowww’ do I make myself do that thing when i hate it and can’t, BUT ‘HOW’ DO I DO IT ANYWAY, and nobody has been able to tell me how. You just did. Freaking finally, someone has explained how to actually get done what I need to get done. I knew it’d have something to do with rewiring something, but I wasn’t sure what. This sounds achievable. Hopefully it works.
Did you mean to say:- कर्मण्येवाधिकारस्ते मा फलेषु कदाचन । मा कर्मफलहेतुर्भूर्मा ते सङ्गोऽस्त्वकर्मणि ॥ ४७ ॥ƁHAGVAD GITA 2.47 “You have a right to perform your prescribed duty, but you are not entitled to the fruits of action. Never consider yourself the cause of the results of your activities, and never be attached to not doing your duty.”
During my college years and up until some years after that this was my modus operandi. Until I suffered several burnouts and found out that I have, among other things, ADD. ADD messes with dopamine in several ways, making it less or more responsive and/or less or more available depending on various individual parameters. In my case, I am now mostly unable to gain any benefits from dopamine resulting in lots of negative outcomes. So this method is not available to everyone nor is it beneficial to everyone. Please choose your words more carefully!
कर्मण्येवाधिकारस्ते मा फलेषु कदाचन। मा कर्मफलहेतुर्भूर्मा ते सङ्गोऽस्त्वकर्मणि॥ श्रीमद्भगवद्गीता 2.47 In the Bhagavad Gita, Lord Krishna tells Arjuna – You only have a right to action (karma) and not to the fruits of your karma. Do not become a person who constantly meditates upon (gets attached to) the results of one’s karma. Do not get attached to inactivity (no karma).
How do you know those kids post-trial baseline motivation changed because extrinsic reward. Let’s assume they baseline is 100. You are assuming that if we don’t do the “sticker” or the “gold star”, then the motivation will always stay at 100. The other assumption is that, the “gold star” practice eventually lead to the motivation dropping to a 80 or maybe a 75 after you stop giving them. These assumptions could be correct – but you argument did not address these key assumptions at all. Could it be that, with the “gold star”, the motivation becomes a 120; then take the “gold star” away, it drops back to 100? Maybe there is a conclusive argument to settle this, but not with your argument. And my interpretation makes more sense – I like basketball, the motivation is 100. I may go 3 times a week. Then if my new girlfriend who I am infacutated with tells me that she likes it when I play basketball. Then my motivation will get up to 150 – I will be going 5 times a week. After a while, if I break up with her, get over that period of heartbreak – do you really expect my motivation to drop to a 75? Doesn’t make any intuitive sense bro.
Conditioning yourself to enjoy hard work sounds like a good idea but something about this seems off…. I was raised to work hard and with the idea that you shouldn’t need a reward for it. Did nothing but make me depressed and give me the very real insight that if there’s no delta, no change, no improvement in position, no external reason for putting myself through something hard, then it should not be done. Giving away your work for free is a great way to make it worthless. Plus no one trains their dog without giving them reward, and slowly fading the reward over time. This seems like a worship of means over ends when potentially the loop (means -> ends -> new end -> new means, in context. Or something like that) would be a better mindset. I don’t doubt Huberman knows his neuroscience but the advice given directly contradicts my experience
No the Concepts those I am studying I Love their Applications in real world n when I actually apply some formula and get the value the calculations which I am doing mindfully are increasing my connectivity with numbers and Algebra All this I am doing is improving my Concentration My these Jee studies have helped me alot till now I was engaged in teanage distractions in my class 10th and was going to wrong path but my these studies helped me to get out from that distraction and focus on my Growth 📈 All I want to say is it is not painful It is Glorius❤❤❤
I find the process to be most pleasurable when the task goes SMOOTHLY, without interruptions or unexpected problems. However when my internal hypercritical abusive parent tapes show up and viciously attack me, the pleasure in completing a task effectively completely disappears. The level of errors and missteps also skyrocket when the inner abusive parent tapes arrive. The schedule upon which said hypercritical tapes run, can be as frequent as every 30 seconds. I don’t need pleasure in the process; I need effective blocking and silencing of the malevolent hypercritical parent tapes!!!
this is great advice if you’re actually learning or picking up a skill. how do you motivate yourself when you’re in a thankless job where your work is often taken for granted by others? perhaps one that doesn’t inspire much personal growth because you’re just following rules/guidelines/instructions like an automaton? how do you convince yourself that you’re doing something important to keep yourself motivated? there’s rewarding pain, and then there’s just senseless pain – challenges that are a complete waste of time because you walk away without growing.
That´s true… to some extent. Because it ignores the basis on which what someone may or may not find rewarding is in many ways determined by their learning history. What associations they have made between stimuli and private events, and how they relate and act on them. It is not as easy as a change of mindset. Sometimes it requires an entire new conditioning, and sometimes, no matter what, the person will never be capable of developing the tools to do so. And it´s ok. There is no “beast mode”, no real “grind mindset”. Because we live in acontext that determines what we do and how we react. Ignoring that, and simply thinking that it´s a matter of perspective is the quickest way to frustration and blame when you can´t achieve.
Focus on the the effort itself instead after setting your goals. The hard work and effort itself might spike your dopamine in a much more sustainable and natural way then. Research of the kids rewarding them after drawing them take those away cause them not to enjoy it significantly could be an example of this process. Learn more from the growth mindset of carol dweck.
This is great advice, however; what if your body is jacked up and doesn’t move right, your mind doesn’t quite work completely(autism/bi-polar/etc), you are in constant pain and mental agony. NOTHING resonates, NOTHING feels better. Even before/during/after the hard work because you are in constant crisis mode of the mind and body? And you know that even after the reward is just more of the same pain and anguish? Where are the real practitioners that can diagnose and ACTUALLY help fix people with ailments? Where is the facility that ACTUALLY sells the hope/help/healing that they advertise? Healthcare in America feels like driving through a fast food drive through. We have so many specialists and too few generalists. So it takes months and months to see the 1 maybe 2 providers in your area that are compassionate about their jobs. Where is the HOPE that SOMEONE can help?
When you do what you love the effort comes naturally. When you spend your life trying to please others with what you do than maybe this kind of manipulation is needed. Ask any musician if it’s painful to play your instrument or if it happens naturally, any bodybuilder if the effort in the gym is too much for them. The answer is no! When I play guitar and write songs, I can go for hours upon hours without even noticing the time going by. It’s been like that since I started at 12 years old. Maybe the effort should be to find what you’re passionate about and not how you can do something you’re not naturally drawn to. Think about that for a minute.
I thank you Dr. Hubberman I have been enjoying your guidance for quite some time now and I credit you, amongst other educators, with the tools/ resources I’ve utilized to heal myself from morbid obesity and childhood delusions of emotional instability. I am entirely grateful to be healthy today. Thank you, thank you, thank you
Process is and should be superior to results, no doubt, but eventually you’ll run out of processes. You’ve been everywhere, you’ve done it all, and now it’s only results that can make you get up in the morning. This whole mindset is way more vulnerable to burnout inflicted boredom. And what would be therapeutic answer to this? Yes, the almighty objective-oriented mindset!
At least for someone with a background of long term stress *slow pace and *organized manner can be really helpful in relearning to do without straining too much Also beneficial in terms of learning and recovering. – Changing habits is often not easy though, hopefully anyone in need can get some help and support in learning to live with more ease, internet communities or peer groups can be a big help as well
This is reason people quit the gym soo much. They want the body now but that is a byproduct of the process. You should never focus on how you look, you should always focus on the way that working out makes you feel afterwards and on the actualy performance and numbers your lifting. Being fit is subjective but lifting a weight for 3 sets of soo many reps is 100% concrete and will always spike motivation when new milestones are reached
“If while washing dishes, we think only of the cup of tea that awaits us, thus hurrying to get the dishes out of the way as if they were a nuisance, then we are not “washing the dishes to wash the dishes.” What’s more, we are not alive during the time we are washing the dishes. In fact we are completely incapable of realizing the miracle of life while standing at the sink. If we can’t wash the dishes, the chances are we won’t be able to drink our tea either. While drinking the cup of tea, we will only be thinking of other things, barely aware of the cup in our hands. Thus we are sucked away into the future—and we are incapable of actually living one minute of life.” ― Thich Nhat Hanh, The Miracle of Mindfulness: An Introduction to the Practice of Meditation
I know that this is an older article but I really wanted to get your insight on something. I feel as if I am on the opposite end of the spectrum when it comes to this subject. I am a person who LOVES the journey and the climb and typically never gets to the top. I don’t seem to be motivated by the reward. I seem to be motivated by the possibility of the experience and the journey itself but I feel like I never really accomplish the original goal. I start something, live in that experience for a while, soak it up, and then I am ready to move on to something new. The reward wasn’t really what I was in it for I suppose. I just wondered what your thoughts were on this in comparison with your message from the article and also, if you have some insight on how to overcome this?!
I am absolutely fascinated by your content. Dear Andrew, I am a professional Remote Viewer (a discipline that was also created at Stanford Research in cooperation with the US Army Intelligence) and an Ex Special Forces Sniper. I just released a book in which I use my Sniper training to teach remote viewers how to enhance their perceptional skills in order to produce more accurate intelligence. I now have watched at least a dozen of your articles, took notes from all of them and I would very much like to make an interview with you about how we can use your research, your (and I don’t mean this in a bad way) tips, to improve the intelligence gathering process even more. Would you be up for that? I am gonna try to reach out to you via email or I will find your contact through common friends maybe. This is very exciting. Thank you again for all this information!
“Don’t spike it before or after effort” What functioning kind of super human mind do people have in which they have any sort of say whatsoever on when that is released.. Trying to find motivation or a dopamine good feeling is like having to send a telegram across the country, through fifteen offices, and wait a week for deliberation and every other department or other objective taking a share of it on the way down, before I get the guy from pawn stars saying “Best I can do is send half a molecule, next week..”
I’m reminded of Daniel Coyle’s The Talent Code where riding on the crest of Discomfort in the process of fearless learning, an individual can greatly speed up the learning process. Being comfortable and Satisfied with the NOW empowers you to have a more comfortable future. Rather than looking to the future to satisfy you, by creating satisfaction in the NOW, you do more than merely shift body chemistry, you change what the spirit creates through Prayer — what the individual holds in their Heart. And this new mindset is at the heart of ALL solutions to Procrastination. 😎♥✝🇺🇸💯
Extremely reductive. This is something religions have been telling for millennia – particularly Christianity and buddhism (if we can call the latter a religion), but wrapped in a popular psychology, secular mumbo jumbo. P.S. I have nothing against religions, I have a lot about hustle culture and popular “psychology”
HARD WORK ONLY LEADS YOU TO BURN-OUT AND DESTRUCTION. STOP HARD WORK !!!!!!!!!!! Smart work, good feeling work, happy work, YOUR TEMPO work. But never hard work. Except if you have special genes that you need to feel pain and destruction to be happy. But for most of people, please, find your own tempo, Work in harmony with nature. No hard work, just move in space and time with fluidity.
Greaat theory, anyone have practical application input for someone starting? It can’t just be as simple as saying “This is painful but because of that pain I will receive piles of dopamine” during effort? By refusing to reward yourself after on the grounds it undermines you. I would be interested in a deeper dive on thew how, not just the why.
this is totaly pointless to me, if i go to gym, i go with goal, am not going to gym just to going there, same with job, you go to work to get some money not cose you like to work…and if i not get paid enough am loosing will, thats it with everything else, maximum investment to minimum effort….i cant trick my brain to eat shit and pretending how i like it…
I think ppl don’t understand. To be successful, you need to be process driven and results driven. Sure u can focus on the effort itself all u want, but when it comes to actl achieving something, there is value in focusing on the destination. Becos only then will u think of the most efficient way to reach it. But I guess this is rather irrelevant to the article as Huberman is talking abiut the resilience portion of the brain, and that to last long thru hard times u need to focus on the effort and not the reward. But when it comes to attaining ur goals, it is certainly beneficial to focus on the end goal.