A person who likes to walk will walk farther and longer than a person who only wants to reach the destination.
That’s a paraphrase of a quote I heard recently.
Stated differently:
If you love the process, you won’t need the reward.
The neurotransmitter dopamine is often called the “reward chemical” because it’s believed to be involved in the reward system in the brain. When we do an activity that triggers dopamine, we feel good, and therefore we want to do more of that activity.
This pleasure/reward mechanism developed as a survival mechanism. If you went out to hunt for your dinner and scored a big win, you’d feel good about it and you’d eat well. That served as motivation to go back again the next day.
If you exercise and feel good from the endorphins that start flowing, you’ll feel “motivated” to exercise again tomorrow.
If you have a drink or do drugs and feel the buzz from your high, you’ll want to do it again.
If you publish something online and it gets a good reception, you’ll feel “motivated” to do it again.
The reward you receive from any activity can be a strong “motivating force” for you to do it again. But it’s not the best source of “motivation.”
The Problem with Reward-Based Motivation
Here’s the problem with sourcing “motivation” in the reward you receive:
What happens when the same activity no longer yields the same reward?
Here’s what eventually happens if you’re doing something because of the pleasure you receive from the reward:
(1) The same reward fails to give you the same pleasure.
You require a bigger reward, which may mean doing more — to the point of putting yourself in danger. This is what happens with alcohol, drugs, and food. It can also happen with “healthy” activities like exercise, speaking in front of crowds, or earning money.
If you’re driven by the euphoria of the PRs, the size of the audience, or the size of the paycheck, you’ll continue to need more and more to get the same pleasure reward.
When does it become enough?
(2) The activity fails to give you a reward at all.
Sometimes you might not get a reward from the activity. If you’re “motivation” to do that activity comes from the reward, that might be the end of that activity for you.
This is why most people quit things like blogging and exercise.
Rewards are elusive and unpredictable.
If you want to do something consistently, you can’t source your motivation in the reward.
So what do you do?
3 Ways to Drive Action Without Rewards
(1) Source Motivation in Reasons, Not Rewards
Your “motive” for doing something is the reason or reasons you have for doing it.
For any activity that you want to do consistently, you must source your motivation in your reason, instead of the reward.
The reason for doing something is your inner motivation. That’s the meaning of motive: the reason. The less you can tie this to a feeling the more stable the reason.
(2) Find Purpose in the Process
If you learn to love the process, the reward becomes secondary.
(3) Use Routines to Create Consistency
Let the process become your routine. When you rely on reasons and routines, you give yourself a stable source of fuel to show up every day, regardless of the reward.
It helps to have multiple reasons.
For example:
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