Internal Versus External Motivation
Do you suffer from burnout? Are you experiencing a lack of motivation? Is your life filled with regrets? Are you struggling to find happiness? These are all symptoms of being externally motivated. To alleviate them, we must instead cultivate internal motivation.
Amygdala And External Motivation
The amygdala is a small, cerebral structure that generates negative emotions. As a part of the limbic system, it plays an important role in ensuring our survival by triggering fear and stress in response to external stimulus it determines to be threatening. For example, it may trigger fear and stress when we hear a loud sound, see a steep drop, or when we experience severe hunger or thirst.
External motivation is the induced impulse to deal with threats identified by the amygdala. It’s called “external” because it’s caused by signals that originate from outside the brain. For example, we may be motivated to run away from a bear that we hear, or kill a potentially poisonous spider that we see.
Unfortunately for us, a sensitive amygdala can also trigger in situations that aren’t actually threatening. For example, we may feel social anxiety when interacting with others—a fear of social rejection caused by our evolutionary need for successful social integration. The induced external motivation to self-isolate can lead to a perpetual state of self-inflicted oppression.
External Dependance
If a person lives in a state of constant fear, their amygdala learns to become overly active and they become dependant on external motivators. For example, consider a student with a fear of public speaking who must deliver a presentation at the end of the month. Due to amygdala activation, they will procrastinate in their preparations until, feeling forced, they are externally motivated into action by the approaching deadline.
A person that is sensitive to external motivators will suffer from an inability to do anything in the absence of outside pressures. For example, consider a childhood over-achiever who sustained high grades due to a constant fear of disappointing their parents. Once they reach adulthood, this person will experience a sudden lack of motivation due to a lack of external stimulus.
As long as a person is externally motivated, they will be a victim to their environment and emotional circuitry—acting based on circumstance and not intention. Consider the cycle of loneliness and social anxiety. A person experiencing loneliness, mistaking it as an internal motivator, will seek the company of others. Then, experiencing social anxiety, they will seek to be alone.
Relying solely on external motivation removes our agency in life and is not an ideal way to live. Instead, we must strive to be internally motivated. But what is internal motivation? And, if emotions are not internal motivators, then what are?
A Healthier Fuel Source
Internal motivation is the opposite of external motivation. It arises when the amygdala is deactivated, corresponding to a peaceful state of mind that is absent of fear. It is mutually exclusive with external motivation—one can either be internally motivated or externally motivated, but never both simultaneously.
Internal motivation is characterized by autonomy, interest, and novelty-seeking. An internally motivated person acts by their own choice and does what they are interested in or curious about.
Autonomy is key to internal motivation. Oftentimes, we try to force ourselves into doing something. Ask yourself, does the word “force” convey a sense of choice? Forced actions inevitably lead to burnout caused by the impure fuel that is external motivation. Internally motivated actions do not suffer from such a drawback.
Rather than the release of dopamine, associated with pleasure and reward, internal motivation instead involves the release of serotonin, associated with satisfaction and happiness. Being internally motivated means being happy, and doing what brings you the deepest satisfaction of self. It represents self-actualization. It means living a life without regrets.
Knowing about the existance of internal motivation means realizing that a lack of external motivation does not consitute a lack of motivation altogether. Sans outside pressures, it is instead the freedom to pursue our internal pulls.
Now that we’ve learned what internal motivation is and why it’s so wonderful, let’s learn how to become more internally motivated.
Cultivating Internal Motivation
Cultivating internal motivation involves autonomy first and foremost. The more we feel we are excercising control in our lives, the more naturally internally motivated we will be. For example, consider two people that have been told to read a book. The first is only given one option while the second is given a bookshelf to choose from. Which person is more likely to complete their book? The first would require external motivators, like a monetary reward or extra credit, while the second would be internally driven.
To cultivate autonomy, stop and ask yourself the following questions:
“How can I exercise control in this situation, instead of being controlled by my emotions, fears, or other external factors?”
“What do I want my life to look like, and am I happy that I am moving my life in the direction I envision it to go?”
“When I look back on today, what do I want to be able to say about myself?”
“Am I proud of what I have accomplished today?”
Instead of forcing yourself to do things you think you must do, do things that let you look at yourself and say: “I feel good about this, and it is an example of me exercising control in my life.”
Every day, be someone that you want to be. For example, do you want to be someone that spends 4 hours working on something they enjoy? Do you want to be someone that takes care of their health? Ultimately, the answers lie within.
Practice mindfulness. When you are performing an action, or making a decision to do or not do something, ask yourself whether it is internally or externally motivated. Ask yourself whether it is in line with the vision you have for your life. If you determine an action is externally motivated, avoid taking it because such actions only serve to reinforce the external motivational system—increasing the amygdala’s sensitivity and increasing your dependance on external motivators.
To discover the things you are internally motivated to do, think of what you tend towards when you are idle—when you are not forced to do anything. Then, when you try to act according to your internal motivation, identify the fears that stop you—the external motivators that push you towards inaction. In practice, cultivating autonomy means resolving these fears to deactivate the amygdala.
When you act according to your internal motivation, here’s something beautiful you will notice: rejection, failure, and the opinion of others will not hinder you, because these are external motivators and do not alter your goals.
So, strive to be internally motivated. Do what you intend to do, not what you feel like doing. Free youself from your emotional shackles and resolve the fears that stand between you and your happiness.
Conclusion
The amygdala, though important in ensuring our survival, can trigger fear in non-threatening environments if it is overly sensitive. Its activation replaces internal motivation with external motivation, causing our actions to be driven by emotions rather than happiness. The amygdala can be deactivated by cultivating our autonomy through self-reflection and fear resolution. Doing so allows us to become more internally motivated and achieve self-actualization.