> "Having high levels of cognitive complexity doesn't assure that one will actually be motivated to utilize their cognitive ability. High achievement is more likely to be associated with high levels of motivation."
This pretty much sums up my life. Times where I have had motivation, I have succeeded greatly. Times where I have not, I stagnate and don't move forward.
Unfortunately, motivation is fleeting. It's as though my brain is hyper sensitive to novelty. If I can find something I find interesting, I am granted immense motivation and focus. But that quickly dwindles.
> "Unfortunately, motivation is fleeting. It's as though my brain is hyper sensitive to novelty"
Not to toot my own horn, but I struggled with this myself and ended up 'inventing' my own psuedo life-philosophy 'Experientialism'[1]. You might find this an interesting way of going about the problem.
Enjoyed that writeup. Definitely got me thinking about the general notion of a life philosophy, and the utility in adopting one. I am guilty of literally rolling some dice for major life decisions, since, most of life to me appears random anyway.
That said, Experientialism would have been great to adopt when I was 20. Maybe I would be filming a travel channel on YouTube or something. Nowadays, I need to adopt a life philosophy that helps me to regular, focussed, great work. Not sure yet what that is...
There's an interesting relationship between will and intelligence. I've often seen people that aren't Geniuses, but their will motivates them in certain fruitful directions. Darwin is the prime example. I'm strongly convinced that there's an artistic side and mathematical side to all intellectual endeavors. The artistic side is the vision, which is formed by the unique will of the individual. The mathematical side is the capacity of exploring the space of that vision. The more of it you have, the more swiftly you can move through that space; however, if your vision puts you in the wrong space, intelligence alone is useless.
This pretty much sums up my life. Times where I have had motivation, I have succeeded greatly. Times where I have not, I stagnate and don't move forward.
Unfortunately, motivation is fleeting. It's as though my brain is hyper sensitive to novelty. If I can find something I find interesting, I am granted immense motivation and focus. But that quickly dwindles.