Category: Blog Posts

6 Types of Motivation and How They Can Improve Your Life

motivation can guide you to the top of the mountain

motivation can guide you to the top of the mountain

Motivation is the one of the most important aspects of life. If you live your life without this important part, it is like being on a journey without a proper direction.

At least, I find motivation very important for my life. I’m sure you have something that motivates your life too.

Good motivation is what fuels me into action. It propels me toward achieving my heart’s desires.

It is true that most of the time I try my life not to be driven by forces that come from outside. However, motivation is still very important to me, and represents a crucial gratification for a happy life.

I believe the type of motivation matters. When I was younger the main motivational power in my life was achievement motivation. It was behind most of the things I was striving to achieve, like finishing school, having a successful carrier, acquiring material things, etc.

This type of motivation is not bad as it is, however, as I grew older, I found out that I need something deeper and more profound to keep me going. Then I discovered spiritual motivation.

In this post I will try to present several types of motivation that have impacted my life in the past and I know that will have a huge impact in the future too.

Here are some of the more important life motivations.

Types of Motivation

Achievement Motivation

Achievement motivation is one of the most important driving force in everyone’s life. It is a strong force that makes us pursue our tasks, no matter how hard and complicated they are.

I use it all the time when I need to pursue some goals important to me. For example, the other day I was strongly motivated to write a paper for a research journal, because I knew it could have a strong impact on certain aspect of my carrier as a scientist.

If you want to climb the pinnacle of success this type of motivation will come in handy. People with achievement motivation are usually risk takers that stop at nothing to achieve their goals.

Do you have a burning desire for achieving success? If not, you’ll have to cultivate it to push yourself toward the goal. You will have to keep thinking about your goal and develop an almost obsessive desire that completely fills your mind and attention.

So, set some time aside, find your true life’s purpose, and let your achievement motivation keeps you working toward accomplishing that purpose.

Competence motivation

Competence motivation is another type positioned high on my list of favorite motivations.

If I want to stand out from the other people, I’d better be able to do something valuable or unique. So, this motivations makes you want to strive to achieve mastery in some area of life.

If you are driven by this type of motivation, you are always trying to outdo your peers in whatever it is that you do. You are trying to improve your problem solving abilities, which gives you an upper hand over your competition.

As a rule, this type of motivation is great because it leads to a comfortable and fulfilling life.

Power motivation

Power motivation is yet another type of healthy motivation.

Who doesn’t want to be influential, to be in charge of the forces that change everything around us. Power motivation will help you in cases where you want to establish firm control at work or in any activity involving other people that is really important to you.

If you work in a competitive environment, this type of strong motivational force will have the greatest impact on you and on the people around you. Beware, however, power can backfire if misused.

Attitude motivation

Attitude motivation is a subtle type of motivation. It has to do with your predefine attitudes toward life, how you feel about the future.

This is probably my favorite type. Because if you develop positive attitude toward life in general, your thoughts and feelings will always be right in every situation.

With positive attitude you can accomplish everything, even the most complicated things.

At the same time you should do your best to eradicate negative attitudes from your mind. They are detrimental and have a negative impact on your performance.

Fear motivation

Fear motivation is something I never recommend because it involves punishment, or other negative consequences. Besides, fear is a negative emotion and I’d try to avoid it as much as possible.

In the business world, there is an expression that describes this type of motivation very well, “carrot and stick”. When the carrot (incentive) motivation fails, the stick (fear) is the driving force.

My advice is to try to avoid fear motivation as a driving force. Not only are the other forms of motivation more effective, but your life would be so much better and more fulfilling without fear in it.

Spiritual motivation

Not all goals in life are goals of material achievement, status, or social recognition. Above them there comes our deepest need of spiritual achievement. We are spiritual beings first and foremost.

This is where spiritual motivation kicks in. It is the strongest force of all. Nothing can motivate me more strongly than the burning desire of my heart for spirituality.

This is a form of long term motivation that drives us toward goals of unimaginable power and beauty.

If you’ve been infected with this type of motivation, you know how powerful it can be. You ought to follow the call of your heart toward the heights of your spiritual achievements.

On the other hand, neglecting the spiritual side of your self can never bring any lasting happiness and satisfaction.

The significance of motivation

If you consider the six motivational forces described above, you won’t have any difficulty seeing how significant motivation is. Motivation builds a bridge between you and your life goals.

Motivation fuels your life force and drives you toward reaching your goals. Life without motivation is hard to imagine.

So learn how to motivate yourself, pick the one that is best for your goals and make sure that your car never runs out of gas.

References for further reading

Intrinsic and extrinsic motivation: www

Maslow’s hierarchy of needs: www

Motivational wave (motivational technique): www

Other techniques to increase motivation in your life: www

Spiritual and motivational stories: www

Photo by Sam Hawley

Filed under: Blog Posts, Personal Growth

Adept

adeptAdept is a person trying to advance enough on the path of spirituality to become a master.

In general, a person proficient or skilled in something.

In Magic, an adept should possess considerable magical knowledge (rituals, spells, divination, psychic powers). They should be initiated in the art of alchemy and possess power over the four elements.

In spirituality, an adept should strive to achieve enlightened consciousness.

A term closely related to the Adeptship is “the great work“. It takes a lot of time, if not multiple incarnations, to complete the process and become an Adept. Therefore this expression.

The secret knowledge is revealed to the Adept over time. Step by step, the Initiate will complete this great work in due time. They will then attain a perfect union between the body, soul, and spirit.

The origin of the word “adept” seems to be derived from Latin expression, adeptus, meaning “the one who has attained” (the secret of transmuting metals).[1]

Dr Claude Brodeur, PhD, say about the path of the Adept [2]:

This path is not for everyone. It is for those who have come to realize that an inner world exists. This world is as real as the world we see, hear, feel, and touch. This inner world far surpasses in importance the external world of manifestation.

Gnosis.org writes on the Hierarchy of Adepts [3], or the Great White Brotherhood of Spiritual Masters. In this sense, an Adept should be understood as a highly developed spiritual person.

Here is what the Sanctus Germanus website [4] says about the Adept of the Brotherhood:

To become a perfect adept takes long years, but at last he becomes the master. The hidden things become patent, and mystery and miracle flee from his sight forever. He knows how to guide force in this direction or that — to produce desirable effects. The secret chemical, electric or vital properties of plants, herbs, roots, minerals, animal tissue, are as familiar to him as the feathers of your birds are to you.

The Theosophical doctrine defines the process of Adeptship [5] as follows:

Adeptship is the identity of the innermost self of man with the innermost self of the universe, the Atma with the Paramatma, pseudo-individuality is dissolved. The Adept abides in perpetual experience of identity with Universal Spirit. This is Perfection, Nirvana or Salvation – liberation from illusion of separated individuality. This is the highest human attainment and the spiritual “purpose” of existence.

References

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adept

[2] https://zenol.tripod.com/adept.html

[3] https://gnosis.org/wise_men.htm

[4] https://www.sanctusgermanus.net

[5] https://www.teosofia.com

Photo by Moyan Brenn

 

Filed under: Blog Posts, Glossary

Increase Your Happiness by Practicing Non Judgment

Increase Your Happiness by Practicing Non Judgment

We live our lives judging everything around us. In fact, I don’t really know about you. But I know that most of the time I do precisely that.

Judging.

I tend to judge myself, judge other people, and judge the various situation that occur around me during the day.

More than I’d like to admit to myself, I tend to find certain people hard to like, I pick out their character flaws and judge their mistakes. All in all, I tend to judge everything.

Most of the time this happens automatically, without my wanting to do so. It is ingrained in how I observe the world around me. I hardly notice my judging most of the time.

The sad thing is I only become aware of this ever present mental activity afterward, and sometimes not even then.

But this realization doesn’t stop me from trying. I know I have to try, because it is so important.

Developing a non-judging attitude is such a life-changing opportunity.

It is a great thing when I manage to catch myself judging. Because than I can correct myself. I can stop my subjective take on the situation.

And whenever I manage to do so, I feel great, I feel so relieved, and light like a feather. My body and my mind both feel the benefits of my non-judging.

If you think you are an objective person, I urge you to think again. If you look hard enough, it is likely that you too will find yourself perceiving the world through judging it as good or bad.

Let me propose an exercise.

Practicing Non Judgment

Pick a time during the day at your convenience. Let’s say half an hour while sitting on a park bench for starters.

Make a conscious decision to let go of judging during that time. Decide that whatever happens during that half hour, your mind will stay silent. You are developing a non–judgmental mindset. You will  just observe. You will be an objective, neutral observer.

Just be there, present in the here and now, not thinking about if the things that are happening are good or bad. Feel the sensations, the wind in your hair, the people passing by.

Don’t think about them, experience them, or shell I say feel them. Observe the phenomena, they are neither good or bad. They are just happening. Let them happen.

You are not the center of the Universe. You are not in charge of anything. You are not required to judge anything at all.

Can you do this for hafl an hour a day?

After all, this seems like an easy exercise. I know, it really does. But here is the deal.

I bet it won’t take 5 minutes before you find yourself judging something or someone. At lest that what’s happening to me.

Don’t be discouraged though. The exercise I just described is one of the most useful techniques for practicing non-judgment. Which brings me to…

Judging and Discerning

We all know what judging means. Discerning, on the other hand, is something different. If you discern, you don’t judge, you just perceive the objective state of how things are.

Whenever I’m discerning, I observe the objective reality around me. I notice details, I see the sunlight reflecting off the objects in my room, I hear the voices of my friend talking…

True discernment is a very alert state of mind. There’s no time for making comparison. Let me briefly explain what I mean by making comparison.

When we judge we usually compare how things or people are and how they should be. We are usually not satisfied with how things are and we want to turn them our way.

For example, a friend of mine talks like a businessman you’d find in Wallstreet, even during a casual conversation. It absolutely makes me want to stop him, but I never do that.

I just silently complain in my mind. This is a perfect example of judgment because I have a wish for him to be different and I disagree with the way he speaks even if I don’t reveal my dissatisfaction to him.

When it comes to people I don’t know, the situation is no different. I judge them very subtly and I do that by the minute.

That guy, he could eat less, that lady is so uptight, these people are inconsiderate, this car shouldn’t be parked here…

Always the same dissatisfaction and the same desire to change something the way I want.

Do you see how this leads to suffering? My own suffering. It simply prevents me to be happy in the present moment.

And please stay with me for just a moment. I have to make the following point.

The Good and the Bad

Really, who am I to know if something is good or not? How can I tell if something is good or not good?

Moreover, what appears to me to be bad, could turn out to be my greatest blessing! And often it does.

Likewise, what appears to be bad for the people I judge, might be their greatest blessing in the future.

Maybe the guy who is overweight has to go through that experience to realize how wrong his lifestyle has been, and to change it for the better. Who knows, he may then help thousands of people to deal with their weight problems.

Maybe the car that appears to be parked blocking pavement, is actually preventing some unfortunate turn of events otherwise doomed to happen.

And my judgment doesn’t help the people I judge either. It doesn’t ease their suffering.

Moreover, they sense my energy, if not consciously then on an unconscious level. They sense it, and it doesn’t help them feel any better, only worse.

My judgment hurts them. I send them negative vibrations, negative thought patterns, and negative emotions.

And if I judge my friends, for sure I’m not appreciating them enough, I don’t accept them for the kind of persons they are. I’m writing them off and there’s no room for dialog.

I’m focusing on just a several personality traits, neglecting many of their positive characteristics.

In addition, I may fell superior with respect to the personality flaws I judge, which makes me being self-centered and egoistical.

We are too limited as human beings in our understanding of the world to be able to tell what’s good for us. The best choice we have is not to judge but to totally embrace what God sends us our way.

In reality, things are neither good nor bad. And we should learn to go through the world without the heavy burden of judgment.

We can always make a conscious choice not to judge. And each time I do that, I feel great! Each time I’m ready to discern instead of judge, I start to feel the peaceful quality of acceptance and the blessed joy of letting go of clinging to my way how things should be.

If you decide to try non-judgment, start small and go from there. Nobody is asking you to practice non stop. I think it would be impossible.

Judging is part of our human experience. Decide to practice the above example from time to time. Or modify it to your needs. Give up your judgment every now and then. And accept what you experience too.

I honestly invite you all to shed the difficult burden of judging, and embrace the enlightened state of living without judgment.

The first step is to recognize your judgment.

The next step is to practice being a neutral observer.

Then, try to listen to your friends, their problems and dilemmas without judging. That will make a huge difference to you and to them as well.

Photo by Akash Malhotra

Filed under: Blog Posts, Meditation & Mindfulness