Motivation Muffins

A body at rest tends to stay at rest. A body in motion tends to stay in motion. These are excellent expectations of physics that apply to things that you can pick up and throw at people. Sadly, we're told that once you get down to the level of things that only people with PHDs in sciences get to see, these expectations don't apply. I'm talking sub-sub-sub particles at the point where something as seemingly simple as "motion" is hard to define. But I'm not a scientist. I know enough to know that I'm wrong as soon as anything more advanced than 8th grade chemistry is involved.

One thing I am good at is overthinking things and then applying a shoddy analogy based heavily in pop psychology to round the whole thought out. I'm the Half-bakery from The Phantom Tollbooth And today's special from the half-bakery is motivation muffins.

Motivation is very much like a muffin. Some people have the wherewithal to take raw ingredients and produce muffins themselves. Then there are the people who have muffin experience limited to what Starbucks is selling that day. Both metaphorically and literally I am at best a Starbucks muffiner. Give me the raw ingredients; some time, some experience and a goal to work towards and I choose the easy way out.

This is where I do my damndest to avoid mixing metaphors like batter for these muffins is similarly mixed. Some people are self-motivators. Tell them to make muffins and they will. Give them a goal to work towards, and they will push themselves to achieve the best possible outcome. The goal that gives them the most internal satisfaction, that builds character, that demonstrates value and a sense of self worth. They are bodies in motion, and they tend to stay in motion.

For others, Starbucks provides a tempting alternative. Using different energies, different types of skills, some people will get their muffins handed to them. They might not have the strong desire to take a hands-on role in achieving a goal, but they know people who are. And there isn't anything wrong with this. Some tasks are ones best left to people who are good at them. I might cook my own meals but nobody's expecting me to build my own car or mine my own baking soda.

I bring this analogy up as part of a point that though not very significant, might need mentioning. The point being that when I said that I'd worked hard to get where I am today, the fact of the matter is I really hadn't.

At least, not always. I spent 4 years as a Communication major - a major based heavily in theories that are quite obvious to anyone who's ever spent more than 10 minutes thinking about how people work. There's also a component of Communication theory that deals with questions about whether people in like-minded argumentative enclaves seal themselves off further as a response to attempts by argumentative interlocutors to argue in the Brockreidean ideal, but that's something only G. Thomas Goodnight would ever think about.

High school me spent many hours learning how to do things like read law cases and journal articles quickly and how to write compelling papers. High school me was the one who did all the work. High school me made mean motivation muffins. I was wound up like Cameron from Ferris Bueller's day off, but damn I could bake. This oven was running hot hot HOT. Needless to say, I got burned out.

So college me went from a body in motion to a body at rest. I didn't work as hard, and I didn't do as much. Some of this was because I didn't really have to. There were a lot of college freshman who spent time learning recipes for motivation muffins that I'd learned already. But as tendencies become habits become character traits, becoming a body at rest made me into a little bit of a slacker. Now that I'm working even less frequently, it's astounding how little I do with my day.

But I'm trying to make an effort to do more. I've got life goals, and the Brothers Mcelroy have tacitly granted me permission to lead a life as ridiculous as possible, which I will be sharing with you. Time to break out the recipe book.