Bootstrapping desire, motivation, and confidence
Merlin Mann is one of my favorite people on the Internet because he’s very real. And I personally identify with his latest shift away from productivity and towards creativity and actually doing things.
I just watched his talk called “Toward Patterns For Creativity“.
A pattern, in this context, is a strategy. The value of a strategy is that it either works, doesn’t work, or partially works. A strategy that doesn’t work is a bad strategy, of course.
He mentioned these three patterns in particular as being patterns that work:
- Want it.
- Work really hard at it.
- Get better.
I’m a little worried that these are still too abstract. Okay, there is something that you want. But maybe you don’t want it enough. How do you change how much you want something? How do you apply the pattern to something?
Desire, motivation, and energy to work are not the most straightforward qualities of the universe. They come from an unknown place in our subconscious. Perhaps from the same place that confidence itself comes from. Can you bootstrap desire, motivation, and confidence? Or must you already have access to them before employing them?
February 10th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
I guess I’m thinking that those 3 bullets (which were deliberately general — by _design_, if you like), might represent three “überpatterns” that could contain those patterns that support them; cups, more than coffee, I guess.
So, “Want it a lot” isn’t in itself a pattern per se, but a way of saying: if you’re struggling to solve the problems associated with ‘going pro’ by setting aside time and making sacrifices….here’s _n_ patterns that can support that kind of problem-solving. And together, they may form a pattern language that shows you how this stuff goes way beyond procedural tips.
As I said (to the point, I’m told, of being really annoying), I’m still working all this stuff out in my head, so this was very much a first cut.
But, I’m persuaded that, for those folks who are wandering in the chasm between half-assed avocation and sustaining occupation, there are proven habits that have tended to work for the folks who’ve found sane, satisfying, and long-lived careers in making stuff.
Now, the hard part is figuring out what each of those things might be.
(OT: congrats on a swell new site, my friend. This is good work you’re doing.)
February 10th, 2009 at 4:15 pm
I totally agree, and am on a very similar hunt for these patterns. If I had to name a few of my top contenders they would be “talk about what you want (so you can hear yourself, and be convinced)”, “build in the void (so you know you’re building what you really want to build instead of what you think others want you to build)”, “find the enjoyment button as early as possible (the self-rewarding aspect of motivation is a great bootstrapper)”.
I will continue to think about this. Thank you for the great book recommendation… it was highly responsible for my own new adventure with this site’s intention and direction.
February 18th, 2009 at 7:11 pm
[...] Mann has me thinking about patterns for creativity. Then, the other night at Jonah Lehrer’s talk, someone from the [...]