At first the concept of being motivated looks fairly simple, but the more one reads the more complex it gets.
Leaving aside employee/work motivation we ask why the average person sometimes or often lacks motivation, and because of the complexity of motivation in humans this is not an easy question to answer.
We’ve all known people who seem to have enormous ability, but who don’t realise this because of a lack of motivation. Then there is always the person who succeeds against all odds.
We’ve all said to ourselves that we would complete this or that task, clean out this cupboard, garage, car, complete a thesis or other project but we lose motivation. Lack of motivation can then be linked with procrastination or even laziness.
Some would-be motivators suggest things like “set higher goals” or “hang out with winners” or “view your mistakes as feedback” but many humans being the complex creatures they are, may not relate to these suggestions.
So how should we define motivation anyway? Put simply it is having enough interest to act energetically in the pursuit of some desired goal. We usually think of some higher and challenging goal.
So what acts against motivation, impedes motivation, or is de-motivating? Plenty it seems.
A lack of motivation for a higher goal can begin very early in life. If in early life there is poverty and threat, the challenging goal is staying alert and alive and the motivation and goal must be to meet basic survival needs like food and shelter, and this is appropriate.
These basic needs must be met before any higher level growth or “metaneeds” can be tackled.
Abraham Maslow, a researcher in the 1960’s arranged human needs in a hierarchy, beginning with the basic food and shelter needs. He then added physical and psychological safety, belongingness, love and affection needs, esteem, competence, recognition and approval needs. Once these were met, theoretically a person could consider meeting higher order needs, such as cognitive, aesthetic, knowledge, beauty, order and understanding. Then “self-actualisation or fulfilling one’s potential could follow. One could be motivated to reach higher order goals because goals related to the basic needs were not bothering us and sapping our energy.
By observing a person’s environment, and position in their life journey it is easy to see how getting basic needs met can conflict with and cut across any motivation toward any higher achievement. Although Maslow’s Self-Actualisation Theory has been criticised because of the small numbers Maslow used to arrive at his conclusions, it is on the whole a useful theoretical model to consider.
(See Part One of Not Good Enough – To Great for more on Maslow on my website Coaching Psychology Online).
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