Because I'm Supposed To

Well here I am. Did I just start a blog or did I inadvertently hang a chain around my neck in the process? I've long heard that in order to become a better writer that you should write a lot. Deep down I know it to be true, but where is the motivation to do it when it feels like an affectation? It's usually not there, but today I'm doing it in spite of my feelings. At the very least, I can expect to rend a tiny pebble from the mountain that stands between me and my inner self.

Now that I'm a few lines into this writing, I realize that it's not been so troubling since the task has begun. And isn't that just like so many things in life? When I used to wrestle in school, I would get nervous before a match. One time in the middle of one of these matches (probably to my own detriment at that instant, but to my eventual benefit as you will see) I marveled that I was not nervous at all. Where had this nervousness gone? It seems it had drowned in a flood of stimuli. I believe both the nervousness for the wrestling match and the apprehension for this writing have roots in excessive pondering. I love to ponder, but by joining this practice with writing I have found my pebble.

Thought and action are a curious pair. I am inclined to address thought at this point, but it cannot be properly introduced without a necessary third element: purpose. But thought and action are more tangible things than purpose. If this were a machine I were talking about, the mechanics of thought and the production of action could not exist without the fuel of purpose. It might be better said that thought and action are held together by the glue of purpose. In my own small mind, thought is the container of the immanent entities of passion and reason and is completely impotent without its companion, action. Action is quite simply the doing of a thing. Without thought, action is involuntary. With thought, it is purposeful. I will not concern myself at this time with the notion of involuntary action.

I believe that action is the instrument of thought and combined, they are the embodiment of purpose.

How on earth then, did I come to this conclusion having sat down to write with the simple purpose of writing for its own sake? Today I began using action without thought and only the purpose of improving my writing. The thought became aroused when I began to write and the purpose changed after combining thought and action. I believe that there is no one that must always come first, but that they must all be present if anything is to be accomplished. Any one may spawn any other.

Perpetual Motivation

Motivation is an elemental thing. It is necessary for any willful act to take place. What I am concerned with today is not motivation regarding simple willful tasks such as wearing a jacket when it's cold or staying awake during a boring lecture. Quite regularly, I feel a strong urge to do a thing, anything--get back in shape, craft a toy for my children, learn how to invest, etc. But rare is the motivation of that sort that persists beyond the first few days of existence.

I recently read some writing I had scribbled down several years ago and realized that I’ve been trying to piece this puzzle together for a long time. It’s ironic, and truly telling, that my ambition for finding a way to perpetuate motivation had waned, and for so many years. Now it has resurfaced and I can already sense it dissipating like a drop of color into a cup of water--so poignant and striking at the first instant then, almost imperceptibly, steadily becoming more dilute until the significant impression of the first moment is replaced by the murky image of a single tinged mass. How can you maintain it?

The chief reason for this fading of ambition has got to be the swarm of ideas and impulses that ceaselessly invade my mind. I cannot stop the swarm from drowning these thoughts within the confines of my mind, but I can snatch and store them safely outside, on paper or digitally. So summaries of these motivations can now persist and be visited as often as I like, provided I maintain the motivation to revisit them. With hope, a scribbled note will reanimate that first ardency that was once so powerful.