you can’t force motivation.
the more you try, the more it escapes you.
so after 30 years trying to whip myself into shape, i experimented with going the other way…
“what would happen,” i wondered, “if i completely stopped trying?”
if running that experiment scares you, take notes from mine...
mainstream education never cared about you
try to remember one time a school teacher mentioned “inspiration”. or recommended you take care of yourself to enable your best work.
the whole game was about forcing you to work: squeezing results out of you as if you were a lemon.
you were brainwashed into this for 13 f¥cking years…
until, finally—tragically—you learned to force yourself to work.
no wonder most people have a dysfunctional relationship with motivation.
imagine you're the typical writer suffering with writer's block:
- you stare at a blank page
- you try to squeeze out some results
- you stress about them not coming
- you squeeze harder
and often you disguise your squeezing:
- you try andrew huberman’s morning routine
- you try to perfect your environment
- you try to find collaborators
- you try the trendiest new journalling method
in our culture if you don’t squeeze you’re called "lazy".
the brainwashing continued here too—until you started calling yourself lazy.
and so you continued inwardly brutalizing yourself to escape the shame and guilt.
respect is given to those who nail themselves up on the cross of win/lose relationships
“for me to win, someone else has to lose.”
“for someone else to win, i have to lose.”
this is a common underlying assumption in modern culture:
- elon musk takes drugs to sleep at night
- arianna huffington almost killed herself from exhaustion
- mark zuckerberg was an anxious wreck building facebook
of course, it’s not that people can't do great things when they push themselves.
it’s that pushing yourself isn’t sustainable.
take the example of what I call “second album syndrome”.
a group of teenagers form a band.
they play together every day.
their songwriting process is spontaneous and unstructured.
they write over a hundred tunes over a decade.
they record their 10 best tracks and their first album debuts at #1 in the charts.
they become famous, seemingly overnight.
they tour the world, selling out arenas.
then they’re summoned to the studio by their manager, who tells them they have 6 months to write and record their second album.
of course it’s not the same.
the manager is squeezing.
this old thinking comes from an old way of living
people used to have to force themselves to work (otherwise things would get real sh!tty real quick).
but stockpiling potatoes for winter is no longer a concern.
in 2024, attention is food.
old thinking doesn’t work in this new world.
we are in desperate need of a fix to the cultural bias toward action.
we are in desperate need of rest.
now, you might think “but i do rest, dan. i go for drinks with friends; i do movie night; i play video games; i go on vacation.”
these are activites.
they might be restful compared to work, but they’re not genuine rest.
the kind of rest i’m encouraging is entirely different.
i’m talking about uncontrived spaciousness.
i’m talking about allowing your mind to settle into whatever is naturally occurring.
i’m talking about letting go of all seeking, interpreting, labeling, describing and judging.
when was the last time you rested your mind?
when was the last time you weren’t distracted or seeking distraction?
when was the last time you weren’t haunted by the ghost of what-to-do-next?
the kind of rest i’m recommending has been prescribed by pinnacle wisdom teachings for thousands of years as the direct route to effortless natural wellbeing (AKA awakening; enlightenment).
it is the answer to the current mental health pandemic.
which means it’s easily the answer to your dysfunctional relationship with motivation.
the degree of good sh!t you experience is directly proportionate to the quality of your rest.
but here’s the really cool thing: once you rediscover how to rest for real you can do as much as you please with the mind and body.
no longer do you have to lose so your boss or clients can win.
no longer do you have to recover after killing yourself to get sh!t done.
because once you recognize your true nature you see that the mind and body are just appearances.
this isn’t to say you don’t need food or sleep.
rather, it’s that running your sh!t doesn’t cost you so much because you stop taking it so seriously.
the truth is that all phenomena are at rest, just as they are.
once you realize this you’re completely free.
but this can only be realized by indirect means. you cannot grab at this or it will slip through your fingers. in other words, you can’t try to rest because the moment you try you’re no longer at rest!
so, let's run an experiment. try this:
hopefully you got a glimpse of what i’m talking about.
if not, keep reading my posts. keep doing my meditations.
if what i’m saying has the ring of truth for you, just keep showing up.
i’ve helped people come off 14 years of antidepressants in a single conversation with this stuff. it works. and it’ll bring more motivation into your life than you ever could have generated by being hard on yourself.
you may not end up doing the same things you are now, because in this relaxation into genuineness you’ll only be able to continue with things that are mutually beneficial.
i know that might sound scary.
but let it be some comfort to you that my life is 100X better than it was before i found this teaching.
so be brave.
and if you need help, click here.
with love from my desk,
dg 💙
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