Motivation

Lets connect! :)

Hello again!

I’ve been away fir a while, I hope you’ve been fine!

2022 has started off just right for me, hoping the same for you as well.

Some days ago I saw a girl post on her story about how ‘January is for planning’ and I never thought about that but I feel it is lowkey true…

I’ll get to the point today. To be honest, I haven’t been feeling really motivated recently.

I’ve been having a lot going on through my mind, and I’ve just felt these past days as if studying, blogging, the website renewal – which I highly encourage you to check out!* – looking for some sources of income (because it’s what we’ve been up to here lately and being a university student abroad randomly hits you on how expensive living is lol), and just trying to keep up a social life, and nourishing my passions and hobbies, while eating properly and exercising.

*at the end of this post, I explain better what these new features are about!

PLUS, I recently came back from my home-country, Mexico, and came back a few days ago… the jet-lag is for real these days.

Being in Mexico, made me have classes from 1am to 5am or even 8am sometimes, which was very tiering as well, not going to lie, and yeah, overall, I’ve been away mainly because of this.

I’ve been feeling ‘off’, unmotivated, ‘mindless’, and with no new ideas on what to really write.

But I’m back! And i’m here to be as consistent as possible again for you and me 🙂

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Cool.

So, I was reading (currently finishing ‘when bad thinking happens to good people‘ – very important book to read these days I would say… here’s what it is about) my book, and suddenly I got to a part that talked about motivation.

And it was one of those aha moments, when you are reading something and it is just related to your life situation.

This is from a philosophical point of view of motivation, but it talks about, what is the philosophy of motivation.

It seems as if many philosophers have been struggling to find out the actual reason for this ‘motivation’ thing in our life to exist, but they explain how it can come from two different places.

Just adding a quick note, and fun fact, all of the previous I wrote it before getting a concussion, lol, I'm fine now, but my mind has been literally shaken, so hey... new ideas might come too. 

I'm kidding... maybe

Back to business, motivation comes from two places, according to philosophy. Either it is external or internal.

It all comes from the unconscious, or subconscious, idea of asking oneself ‘Why am I doing this?’.

Motivation starts there.

Motivation: a reason or reasons for acting or behaving in a particular way.

Oxford Languages

External motivation means that cognitive states (beliefs for example), and motivational states (things that move us to do what we do, and act on our believes) are two different things.

The book explains it like this:

If you saw someone drowning on a lake, you’d think about saving them because it is morally right, but you wouldn’t do it unless you have some motivational state, such as some admiration for the person, love for them, hope for reward, etc.

Internal motivation says, ‘a rational judgement that an action is right cannot but move one to perform the action’.

This saying, if you have a belief of something that is good or right, it is itself moral.

If a friend tells you a secret and tells you not to tell anyone, and you promise to not tell anyone, and keep the promise… you do this because you consider it morally right to do so.

You are internally motivated to keep the promise.

You don’t have to ask yourself Why am I doing this?, because you feel moved to do it. We judge this to be the right thing to do. So we do it.

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I don’t know, I just felt like sharing a little about what I’ve read and how it just correlates with me and my life right now.

Maybe the reason why I’m not motivated is external in my case… not sure to be honest.

I’m not saying this is the only theory on motivation. I’ve found this is an interesting perspective about the topic.

A lot of things are included inside the motivation topic: mindset, perspective, paradigm, environment, context, influences, goals, energy, complexity of a task, challenge creation, understanding, education, purpose, etc.

But this is a longer and more complicated topic than we usually think… not getting into each part of it, but I guess you understand my point…

Also to show you how cool of a book it is, and why you should give it a try ;).

Anyway, in conclusion, I haven’t really gotten to feel motivated this past month.

I’ve been trying to figure myself out a little, finals are more present than ever, and I got injured… besides, I’ve been feeling better with myself and my life situation, which has made me go in a way ‘blank’.

Not that I don’t think, or don’t care. I just feel my mind has been shut off a little this month.

I’ve sat down and thought, what should I write about?

I don’t know.

Genuinely I don’t.

I don’t feel like sitting down these days and write, because I have nothing in mind to write about. Or nothing that motivates me enough to write.

And I figured there was no problem with giving myself a break. Just not write if I don’t feel like it.

I am the type of person who thinks that it is always good to push ourselves a little to do the things we like, or we know we ‘should do’, because sometimes it may be what we need… but this time I decided I’m not doing that.

I’ll listen to myself. And myself tells me, we don’t want to do this. Ok, we won’t.

And here I am back! Happy to be writing again and feeling inspired to talk about some of the few things I’ve reflected, and the many of them I’ve learnt.

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I figured, part of the reasons I’ve also not been feeling motivated, is because I’m not sad anymore.

And as messed up as this can sound, I strongly believe it’s true.

Why?

Well, listen to this theory I listened to.

Buck up your seat belts 😉

Being sad, unconsciously, it’s a vibe. For almost everyone. In the way that, we tend to romanticize it a lot.

And in fact, the romanticism era, was in a way, an era in which people romanticized melancholy and romantic loss, mostly, as well as love, dark colors surrounded by beautiful moments.

In a way, art started to become, visually, a very expressive for of art for humans. Beauty was made sad, and ‘to die for’, but it was done in a way which looks so beautiful… incredible how humans are able to unite beauty and sadness so wonderfully.

*insert some romanticism era pics*

You understand what I mean now?

Funny because this is an artistic movement I’ve always been very drawn into for some reason…

In general, I mean, like big castles, big dresses, Victorian-type era, 1800s… you know? that era…

Maybe in a past life I lived there! Who knows?

Anyway… this melancholy vibe and aesthetic is very appealing, for some reason, to humans.

It makes us feel ‘comfy’, in the way that, imagine being in your house, a cold and rainy day, with blankets, a¡watching movies and enjoying yourself – type of vibe.

It brings comfort and it is relatable.

All of us have felt sad or cozy at some point.

These are feelings we know, and many times find comfort in.

All of this to say, we unconsciously like seeing ‘sadness’ and ‘melancholy’ because we are used to romanticize it.

*This is a reason people are very in Emma Chamberlain now a days, lol, but whatever, out of topic…*

The time I began this blog, which was a very tough time for me, was a time in which I thought a lot.

Not overthinking, but I though about everything constantly.

My mind wouldn’t shut up.

And this, provided me with a lot of insights about life.

I saw everything, and thought about the teachings I’d be taking from that, or the spiritual essence each thing had.

I haven’t stopped doing this, to be honest, but I don’t think I do it the same way i once did.

Before, i did it ALL THE TIME with EVERYTHING.

Really everything.

And now, I feel more at ease. The harsh time is gone. I’m at peace with me – because I had those previous moments.

And all I want to get with this is that, I got more inspired to write when I was sad than when I’m happy.

You know what they say…

The pain is the inspiration for the artist.

😉 someone idk, but hugs and kisses for you, if you’re still in the realm.

Our brains change when we are happy and when we sad.

We don’t think the same things. We don’t act the same. We don’t say the same things. We change. We feel differently.

And this is in part a blog reason of why I also stopped feeling ‘motivated’ and inspired.

I wasn’t thinking as much as I did before. What am I supposed to do now?

This might be the start of a new era for the blog as well! 🙂

We’ll see what this brings.

Besides, I feel, for almost everyone, January is like the month where no one really does anything… In the sense that, everyone is figuring out what the first part of the year is going to look like to them, right?

I don’t know, but you know… it’s the beginning of everything, what should I do, how, when, why, where, etc.

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Also, just wanted to disclaim some changes that have been going on in the blog 🙂

First of all, we now have a ‘Privacy Policy’ and ‘Terms and Conditions’ link at the bottom!

I encourage you to read them up, if you’d like to understand better the conditions and policy on this blog!

Second, we now have an improvement on the ‘Recommendations‘ tab!

Just click the image of the book you’re interested in checking out/buying, and ta-da!

Easy peezy. 🙂

You can now click the link and it will send you directly to the link of where to acquire the book online :).

I’ll also start a new section as well in this blog, where I’ll make some book reviews, so you have some idea on my opinions about different books in this section.

There will probably be spoiler alerts!!!!!!!!!!!!! So be aware!

I’ll always remind you about that in the posts, but just for you to keep in mind.

I hope this year is doing you good so far!

I love you

I send you love and light always.

Milena