Rediscovering Motivation

Needing some help in a time when confidence is becoming harder to come by, I found an interesting article that illustrates how overgeneralization ties to demotivation. Overgeneralization involves taking a single example of something and applying it to every possible instance when it is not rational to do so. For example, a person might see a teenager dressed in hipster clothing, leading her to come to the conclusion that all teenagers want to be gangsters. There exist plenty of teenagers that don't want to be gangsters and it's possible that the one in this example has no choice but to dress like one so this conclusion is an overgeneralization.

Overgeneralization results in demotivation when it causes us to drag ourselves through the mud. There come countless times in life when we work hard at something just to have it go wrong or build up towards a goal just to have a barrier rise up in front of it. It's extraordinarily easy for us to conclude that the cause of the problem isn't in what we did, but rather something about ourselves. Far too quickly we come to conclusions like “That conversation didn't go well because I'm incurably awkward.” or “I didn't get the job because I'm hopeless.” In reality, how unlikely is it that the other person just wasn't being understanding or that the job really wasn't a good fit? It's critical to evaluate the situation before putting the pin on yourself.

As the article states, Martin Seligman and his colleagues discovered that the two most deadly assumptions you can make about a setback is that the cause is permanent and that the cause is pervasive. Permanence says, "This is always going to be here and I'm stuck with it”. Pervasiveness says, "My life is ruined because of this". These are very unrealistic conclusions, but they are conclusions that are very easy for our realistic minds to pick up.

The key to avoiding this line of thinking is to catch yourself in the act. It's important to remember that we all experience setbacks and they are there to learn from rather than to tear us down. Before you come to the conclusion that you're inherently bad, check your line of thinking for an overgeneralization. When you find it, you will instantly feel your negativity lose its edge and your motivation come back to life. You will be able to get back up and continue to pursue that which you love, undefeated.

If you would like to read more, here is the article.