What gives you motivation?

[The_Wolf_Who_Cried_Boy]

Apathy is the driving axiom in my life and it gets worse as I age. Contrasting myself to others this is one of the more glaring diffrences.

I just don't get it and never really did.

Do you derive motivation from within, or perhaps from your relationships to others?

 

[_xxx_]

I want to improve, I want my life to become better (in the way I think of it). In order for that to work, both inner and outer factors play a certain role.

Humans are social beings, so it is important to build yourself a niche in which you'll feel well with people AND with yourself. If you're being apathic, then something's obviously missing. Now you just have to find out what it is.

 

[DudeMiester]

My trick is having an over-inflated ego, but knowing that I have one and taking the appropriate measures to correct it. In other words, I think I'm utterly fastastic and that nacrissism is probably inevitable, but I don't actually act that way. It's just a sublte confidence I guess.

Right now though, my problem is more distraction then motivation. I'm a whore to my little diversions. I think it's because I have such a magnetic personality that they are innately attracted to me. In fact, I've made strait men question their hetrosexuality on more then one occasion, but I'm not gay. I'm just a nearly ideal specimen of a man, not perfect, but close.

I could go on and wax lyrical about my serendipitous birth and such, but needless to say, when you're this good that's all the motivation you need, but not in a self-indulgent way. Then again, self-indulgence is my current problem, so maybe I'm completely wrong about this. At minimum though, it's a tool in establishing the internal self-sacrificing convicition necessary to accomplish anything significant in life.

 

[The_Wolf_Who_Cried_Boy]

It's astonishing that despite never having met you and living on the other side of the planet, and thus far having exlusive fondness for the ladies, my mind is now intoxicated by your refined yet raw masculinity DudeMiester.

Should I live a thousand years and bare witness to the rise and fall of empires, I would still look back upon this chance meeting as the defining moment in my existance...

If you're being apathic, then something's obviously missing. Now you just have to find out what it is.

I only ever find life increasingly alienating, and not in the exciting way with lasers and spaceships.
Whats strange is I see men with wives and families and feel envy yet know full well the reality would be I'd suffocate in their position.
It's all just a big pit of sardonic apathy.

 

[AlNom]

I can't stand the human race as it is, so I'm motivated to remake it as I see fit.
(I figure it'd take...a very long time anyway)

More women would be a start.

 

[Crisidelm]

Dreams and poetry, that's all.

 

[KimB]

Apathy is the driving axiom in my life and it gets worse as I age. Contrasting myself to others this is one of the more glaring diffrences.

Yeah, apathy is rather nasty. Me, I gain my motivation from my enjoyment of life. I've always tried to make sure that I'd enjoy life as it comes, and this includes work. This is one reason why I stayed on for graduate school. I could be making much, much more money than I make now if I'd gotten a job after getting my BS. But I wouldn't be enjoying my job nearly as much.

Similarly, my current plan is to move on and try to become a professor at a research university. This isn't going to be an easy thing, and I won't make much money for some time along that path. But I think I'd enjoy living as a professor so much more than in a higher-paying corporate or national laboratory research position. But getting to that point requires that I do a certain amount of work. So I do it.

 

[Cartoon Corpse]

i seek truth. that will bring you all the 'trouble' you can handle in this life. most people just pretend to know all about things, they, in fact know little or nothing about. they love to abuse anyone who isn't a sheeple. that should stoke your belly fires quite nicely.

probably the reason you're apathetic is you realize obediently following the status quo is NOT where truth lies.

 

[dskneo]

..to win €uro millions and screw society with all its standards....

the "looks good" standards,
the "looks bad" standards,
the "having to keep a job and pretty girl to look like a fulfilled life" standards...
....but one has to be in the "looks good" standards to have a shot to the "aparent fulfilled life" standard, like an invisible cage.


so what drives me... is to follow those standars and scream "f*ck you all" when i leave the job everyday and most importantly, to play in euromillions every friday (and this needs money, that can only be gained by following standards....)

thank god for Dragon ball Z And all those great movies and series hollywood keeps puping out.

 

[_xxx_]

Whats strange is I see men with wives and families and feel envy yet know full well the reality would be I'd suffocate in their position.

Now that's true, but that's just because you don't have the right woman yet then. Same here, I know I'd suffocate too (actually I did suffocate in my last 2-3 relationships, that's why I ended them), but that's only wrong partners and not mening that there is no better way to have a relationship. It'll happen eventually, inevitably.

 

[nintenho]

What gives me altruistic or selfish motivation? Whatever happens though, I don't replace my resentment with apathy, that's called being an idealist.

 

[nutball]

What motivates me? --- these days not a lot really. I guess I still enjoy finding out new stuff, I enjoy doing things others can't. But I spent half-a-lifetime getting somewhere I thought I wanted to be only to find that it wasn't what I thought it was. So these days I spend my time drifting and looking for other avenues to explore!

YSimilarly, my current plan is to move on and try to become a professor at a research university. This isn't going to be an easy thing, and I won't make much money for some time along that path. But I think I'd enjoy living as a professor so much more than in a higher-paying corporate or national laboratory research position. But getting to that point requires that I do a certain amount of work. So I do it.

Good luck, I hope you find happiness down that route (I didn't!).

 

[_xxx_]

i seek truth.

I think that's just a matter of personal interpretation, there's nothing like some "universal truth".

 

[KimB]

Good luck, I hope you find happiness down that route (I didn't!).

Well, I enjoy being a graduate student, both research and what TA positions I've had, so I expect I should enjoy being a professor as well .

 

[nutball]

Well, I enjoy being a graduate student, both research and what TA positions I've had, so I expect I should enjoy being a professor as well .

It's the politics and the egos that gets to me Science isn't the meritocracy it tries to portray itself as being, not on a day-to-day basis, nor an individual-to-individual basis. Teamwork? What's that? Fair division of labour is defined as "you do the work, I take the credit".

I have a number of friends who passed through PhD and early post-doc at the same time as I did, but moved from academia into the RealWorldâ„¢ (by choice I should add). One or two are working in high finance and so on in the City of London, so they know what "competitive environment" means. Every one of them says to me that academia was far more kniving, back-stabbing, ego-oriented and full of basically just petty personality-driven turf-wars than anything they deal with in the current careers.

It just depresses the hell out of me.

 

[nAo]

My Friends/Relatives + My Work + My Will + Nutella!!

 

[KimB]

It's the politics and the egos that gets to me Science isn't the meritocracy it tries to portray itself as being, not on a day-to-day basis, nor an individual-to-individual basis. Teamwork? What's that? Fair division of labour is defined as "you do the work, I take the credit".

I've heard this last point, but my experience has been quite far from this at Davis. My advisor, for instance, has me listed as first author on my first scientific paper, since I did all the work, even though he had most of the ideas. This may be field-dependent, or vary from university to university.

I have heard that the politics can be a bit nasty here at Davis, but it seems that most of the professors within our group are friends. I think I could deal with shit now and again as long as I had a good group of friends in the field, and I enjoyed the work.

 

[nintenho]

Chalnoth, what are you studying?

 

[KimB]

Chalnoth, what are you studying?

Physics (Cosmology).

 

[K.I.L.E.R]

Boredom.

Also to become better than Chalnoth at maths.
(Couldn't help it Chalz )