Emotion and Motivation

Motivation can be considered as the drive behind our existence. In its very basic form it is what drives us to find water when we are thirsty, shade when we are hot and shelter when we are cold. This process of maintaining our body at its optimum levels of temperature or energy is known as homeostasis and is carried out by the release of various hormones and neurochemicals in the brain. They inform the body that it needs food, water or is over heating and needs to take action to restore things to normal.

Pleasure plays a big part in our motivation and satisfying a need that we have can bring us a sense of great pleasure. I do a bit of running and after a 10km run, drinking a bottle of water can be a pleasurable experience as I replenish depleted water reserves. In this case I receive a positive reinforcement from drinking the water and increase the likelihood that I will repeat the behaviour next time I’m thirsty. But pleasure can also be derived by “moving away” from something unpleasant such as a hot fire, this is known as a negative reinforcement. 

In these cases we are referring to the almost automatic motivation involved in meeting our basic needs. Although fundamentally important in keeping us alive, due to modern city living we take them very much for granted. On the hedonic scale they provide us with very little positive reinforcement. Unless of course you’ve just ran a 10km race when a simple bottle of water taste divine. Although our basic needs are met on an unconscious level, it can be resumed as our mind occupying itself for something that is presently unavailable. It is indeed this craving that plays centre stage in how we understand motivation in a modern context.  

Research has shown that at a neuropsychological level there are different systems involved in being motivated. One is involved at an appetitive level, where we fancy or desire something and take action to get it. Whilst it is another more consummatory level that gives us the motivation to actually consume what we desire. Of course we are not the only animals who are motivated to collect things without necessarily being motivated to consume them immediately, squirrels collect nuts and many birds and animals will hide food for later. Without wanting to point out the obvious, there is usually a correlation between what we want and what we like, but not always.  

When we think of motivation we also tend to think of drive, striving and competing all of which in a modern western society are seen as desirable traits that will enable us to achieve to our best ability. In this sense we have a different type of motivation that is more linked to social status or standing, as we compare ourselves to those around us. What can give us a buzz when we perform better than others, can also get us worrying when we don’t quite come up to standard and this can even lead us to feeling shame and self criticism. Our drive to want more, which is what enabled us to convert from being hunters to farming communities with surplus of food all year round, has been a real asset, but it can lead us into some real messes. 

Due to our imaginative mind we have been able to invent new ways to satisfy our desires and our competitive drive. We no longer see who runs the fastest to be able to catch the prize, but now we have a better job, which pays more money to be able to buy a car that goes faster so we can get to the prize first. The only problem is that by the time we’ve done all that we’ve forgotten what the prize was in the first place. Sugar is a high in energy and it’s not surprising that we have an inbuilt taste for it; our ancestors had to take great risks to get honey from bees. But we can lie on the sofa with a big bag of sugary sweets and gorge ourselves Roman style whenever we want. Satisfying our desires, but at the same time creating all sorts of health problems.

The human brain, due to the way it has developed wants more and it wants it better. Unfortunately we can even turn this critical dissatisfaction with what we have upon ourselves. We want to be faster, taller, slimmer, cleverer and certainly more popular. When this highly competitive desire seeking brain meets western capitalism it can be a match made in heaven and of course the advertising agencies know very well how to play upon our insecurities and inadequacies. I myself have a problem with amazon.com as I compulsively buy books that I just “need”. Each one leaving me as unsatisfied as the last one that I consumed. This is one of the great absurdities of modern life. I’ll finish with the words of the Dalai Lama:

“Man sacrifices his health in order to make money.
Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health.
And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present;
the result being that he does not live in the present or the future;
he lives as if he is never going to die,
and then dies having never really lived”

~ Dalai Lama