What’s your motivation?

Thinking man

You know you can discover some interesting quotes in personal calenders. Here’s one I recently read.

“People who are unable to motivate themselves must be content with mediocrity, no matter how impressive their other talents.” - Andrew Carnegie
Have you ever wondered why some people can take a single talent and multiply it’s affects greatly - while others, who are multi-talented don’t make any real impact?

And in fewer cases are those people with multiple talents who seem to succeed at practically every endeavor, while a person with a single talent can’t even positively exploit it.

Why does this happen? Is it that some people are more talented than others? Or more deserving?

Personally, I’ve struggled, practically my entire life, with mediocrity. Actually, let me rephrase that: I’ve struggled with a lack of motivation. However, I have been able (through personal observation and some real honest criticisms from friends and enemies) to see many of my weak spots when it comes to a lack of motivation. And because of this, I have developed (and continue to do so) methods to “manually override” these weak moments.

I say “manually override” because often times our weaknesses and lack of motivation are not necessarily concious actions - but are automatic reactions or habits that have been learned over time and are now second only to breathing.

To Motivate means: to stimulate toward action. To give an incentive for action. To cause to act in a particular way.

When some process is manually overridden, a concious effort is made to do something different. In the industrial and technological world, a system may have checks and balances to prevent a failure of some kind, but every now and then, those checks and balances don’t function correctly (there’s a glitch of some sort) and a manual override is needed to avert disaster.

We often make manual overrides to flirt with disaster, but when is the last time you have made a manual override on your life to avert disaster?

This leads me to believe that the issue of motivation primarily has to do with mindset. How do we approach our abilities? Do we think that we can make an impact? Do we think we are worth the effort? Are we willing to go through the necessary work? How do we handle setbacks? Have we taken the time to forecast the logical conclusion of a particular action or inaction to see where we will end up?

There could be a myriad of different thoughts that run through our minds, but it all boils down to mindset… to motivation.

What drives you to do what you do? What are the incentives that propel you to press through layers of common actions to get to the dreams that live within you?

How can we maximize our potential, so that every gift and talent can be used to impact others and bring glory to God?

In the Bible, Jesus talks of three men who had differing levels of talents. They were told by their master to utilize them to their fullest. Two did so and multiplied their returns… the other, who only had one, was afraid and did nothing. He sat on his talent and no one benefited from what he had to offer. When the master came back the other two were praised and this one was punished.

We don’t know exactly what was running through the man’s mind, who did nothing. But we know that fear paralyzed him and his inaction had a cost.

If you feel that God has placed a dream within you, do some research and find out the necessary steps to achieving that dream. Then pray for God’s leading and begin to DO those steps. There are things only God can do… and then there is the part that God says you and I must do.

What’s your motivation? Let me know what you think.

-Allen Paul Weaver III -

What do you think?