(Stillness in the Storm Editor) “Seek purpose not pleasure”—words of wisdom to live by. Life in the modern world is extremely challenging. Between keeping up with social media, the latest cultural trends, earning a living, and staying healthy—life is more stressful than ever. When we feel stress, we tend to reach for pleasure seeking activities and vices to lift our mood. Goal-oriented strategies emphasize staying focused, which is generally good advice. But if we’re not stopping to appreciate the fruit of our efforts, we’ll train our subconscious in ways that greatly hinder fulfillment and long-lasting motivation.
There are two general types of motivation: goal-oriented and experience-oriented methods. The difference is subtle yet nonetheless impactful.
If you’re a pleasure-seeking type, the thing that motivates you at the moment could be the joy of doing what you’re doing. This has benefits because it keeps you focused and present. But when the pleasurable goal is in the future, it acts as a reward motivation.
Future rewards can cause a negative emotional biasing in the present—because you want the reward but you don’t have it yet, therefore, the present must be less valuable than the future. It’s this potential for depreciating the moment that makes future-reward style motivation techniques so tricky, also known as behavioral modification techniques. They tend to train you to be unhappy in the moment, hoping for some beneficial future that might never come.
Clearly, most of us don’t want this to happen. Hence, if you can make the experience itself, in the moment, the reward, you’re off to a really great start.
A goal-oriented mindset is helpful because it keeps you moving forward in an incremental fashion.
If you are an ambitious person, with a lot of goals and plans for life, you’ll need to stay busy to accomplish everything you want.
But, like the experience-oriented mindset, the goal-oriented mindset can be problematic if not used correctly. If you’re so focused on the next goal you never take the time to appreciate your efforts, you’ll depreciate the present moment while at the same time destroying confidence in yourself.
We have two mindsets that relate to each other. One focuses more in the moment, experience-oriented, whereas the other focuses more in the future. Which one is best?
The below article makes the case for experience-orientation as the best. And to be sure, there are a lot of good reasons provided below. But I am asserting that we need both.
In order to feel maximally fulfilled in life, we need to take the time to appreciate our work while also creating an incremental plan for achieving all our lofty goals. This method recognizes and takes into account emotional needs.
Yes, it is possible to force yourself to complete a task without feeling emotional support but it takes a lot of willpower and determination to do so.
Indeed, strengthening your willpower is a very good idea, as this will help you with everything in your life, particularly those things that require hard work and persistent effort. But we can also use some simple tricks to enhance our emotional well being so that we create the best internal attitude for success.
Here’s the key.
Do your best to invest yourself fully in whatever task your completing. Tell yourself, “As I am doing [insert task] I discover myself becoming more and more excited in the moment, simply to experience the joy of focusing my mind on something I want to do.”
This is an affirmation that is designed to use the language centers of your consciousness to properly frame your activities in a positive narrative. It’s this positive narrative that is the key to consistent positive emotional support. It literally makes us see the world with positive eyes, ensuring we feel uplifted and empowered throughout life.
The human psyche has two possible states of focus and identity.
There’s the primary-state of the raw experience you feel in the moment. For example, the experience of eating a meal, tasting it as you chew, smelling the food, feeling its texture and how it makes you feel emotional, are all examples of primary state perception. When you feel like you are the person experiencing these sensations then you are identifying with the primary state. A good example of this is when you’re on the dance floor, watching an emotional moment in a movie, or eating your favorite dish—your immersed in the experience.
The meta-state is the point of view and opinion we have about the primary state. How do you feel about the meal you just ate? What does it say about your character and how does it fit into the story of your life? These are meta-state questions. When you’re sitting in reverie thinking about an experience you had the night before, going over what happened, and drawing grand sweeping conclusions about it, then you’re identifying with the primary state.
At any given moment your psyche is evaluating your primary and meta states.
For most people, the meta states are the attitudes that influence our emotional quality the most. For example, if you hate washing dishes, even though the primary experience of washing them isn’t horrible—it’s not like you’re having to lift heavy weights or burn your hand on hot objects. But because you tell yourself you hate washing dishes from the meta-state the activity feels hellish.
What’s happening here?
The narrative that you used to contextualize washing dishes is disempowering, that’s the problem. You told yourself that you are someone who doesn’t like doing dishes, thus, when you do them, you feel irritated and frustrated. The moment when you say, “I hate doing dishes” you’re using a hypnotic suggestion on yourself, on that will influence the meta-state, it will tell you how you are supposed to feel. The power of this can’t be overlooked. And if you’re like most people, you’re creating a hellish life for yourself because you’re constantly telling yourself how much you dislike, hate, or loathe what you’re doing.
It’s your life, don’t you want it to be a positive experience? What if I told you that you had the power to make every experience in your life, happy, rewarding and uplifting?
We tend to think that happiness happens to us, that we stumbling upon it from time to time, but it isn’t in our control. Given psychological research, this isn’t true. Happiness is more so a product of attitude and perspective. It’s a product of a personal narrative of meta-state that is uplifting and constructive. We have to learn how to maintain and adjust the meta-state when it becomes negative.
Can you say “attitude of gratitude?”
How do you adjust the meta-state? Given how influential this part of the psyche is, it stands to reason that learning how to maintain it would be beneficial.
One of the ways is through the use of auto-suggestion or self hypnosis. Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) in particular is specifically designed to work with the meta-state.
By saying the below phrase to yourself, you’re sending commands to the subconscious, particularly the part of us that evaluates how we feel about meta activities.
“As I am doing [insert task] I discover myself becoming more and more excited in the moment, simply to experience the joy of focusing my mind on something I want to do.”
“But wait?!” I don’t want to use NLP on myself? Ok. Fair enough. The next question becomes, are you ever not manipulating your consciousness with your words, thoughts, and attitude?
The fact is we’re constantly manipulating our consciousness and states via our language. And other people, especially subtle messages in music and advertising, are doing the same. So we can’t really avoid mind influencing. The solution, I argue, is to become your own influencer. If you can’t help but influence your own mind, and the minds of those around you, shouldn’t we learn how to do it constructively? Shouldn’t we become masters at influencing ourselves and each other in a positive way?
What orientation do you use? Are you experience or goal oriented?
Are you someone who motivates yourself with future rewards or is the purpose of the moment pleasurable enough for you?
How do you talk to yourself, what is your self talk? Is it empowering and uplifting?
– Justin
Related Seek Purpose Not Pleasure — Consciousness “Hacking” | Secrets of Motivation
by Kimberly Key, December 11th, 2018
Having a five-year plan can create a direction in life (and business), yet the wisdom of planning for the future can fall short when it comes to experiencing the joys of the present.
While Eckhart Tolle elegantly captures the transcendental power of being in the moment in his worldwide bestselling book, “The Power of Now,” children might be our greatest teachers in being present in the here and now.
Think about it. Everything is new for a child and they seem to experience each moment with rich clarity while adults buzz past trying to get the next thing done. The child might be sitting and gazing at a butterfly, pondering its magnificent colors with so much zeal that they enthusiastically search their box of colors for similar shades of purple and orange to set out coloring a handmade card for their parent.
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As the child beams with love and giggles while handing the newly colored card to their parent, a goal-oriented parent may miss the magic of the gift and distractedly say thanks while setting it aside as they focus on the list of things to get done.
The distracted parent’s list of to-do items might include: What will be for dinner? What shopping needs to be done? Did I finish the reports at work and will my boss do his/her part? When will my family come next week and what do I need to do to get the house ready for them? I need to tell the neighbors about parking while they’re here. I need to get checks to PTA. Homework needs to get done. I need to work out because I’m gaining weight and worried about my last medical check-up. I also need to make sure the kids get their latest vaccinations.
The list could go on (and probably does!). Half of the to-do orders and judgments about the past and future tend to buzz subconsciously like background music. Getting fully into the moment can disrupt the mental chatter and bring meaning and joy to life.
It’s easy to recognize the importance of paying attention to children in the moment as most people naturally value positive parental vigilance, however, societal pressure and norms tend to reinforce a future and goal-oriented mindset. Like Janet Jackson’s song, it’s like the world around you is perpetually distracting you with, “What have you done for me lately?”
Dr. Wayne Dyer poignantly captured the grim costs of being disconnected from the moment when he stated many people reach their deathbed with the horrific realization that they never fully lived their lives because they were so consumed by chasing the next pursuit.
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Similarly, many cultures around the world express ancient warnings that caution people not to squander breaths and heartbeats as there are only a limited number available.
Returning to the lesson children teach, try to approach every moment and experience with new eyes. Pay attention with all your senses and notice new things. Taste new foods and beverages. Explore the world and the people around you with a curious mind. Don’t assume you know everything. Instead, listen and learn. You might be surprised by the new things you can learn from even your longest relationship. Take adventures daily. Have picnics on the living room floor or in a new park in a nearby neighborhood. Meet your neighbors. Laugh, play, and have fun. Even when doing something as mundane and cleaning the dishes, you can remember the song from Snow White and “Whistle While You Work.”
When approaching a child (yours or someone else’s), see if you can join them in the moment as well. Try to avoid projecting your own goal-orientation onto them with the ever-popular question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Instead, try to sit, listen, feel—and play. This moment only comes once and will not return again. Help them to savor it with you by being fully present.
Life has enough challenges. Don’t make it harder by enslaving yourself and others to an inner task-master that causes so much angst that you miss the butterfly next to you. Allow an experience-oriented mindset to replace goal-orientation and you just might encounter a much richer and more rewarding five years than you could have planned.
About The Author
Kimberly Key is past division president of the American Counseling Association and author of Ten Keys to Staying Empowered in a Power Struggle.
Not sure how to make sense of this? Want to learn how to discern like a pro? Read this essential guide to discernment, analysis of claims, and understanding the truth in a world of deception: 4 Key Steps of Discernment – Advanced Truth-Seeking Tools
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