Motivation and Emotions

Chapter 8 Motivation and Emotion After twenty plus years, I returned to school to acquire my degree and further my education. My friends and family could not understand why I wanted to take time so much time out of my life to do this. They would tell me, “you already have an established career”. They could not understand what drove me to take this road. They felt I was missing out on life. So after reading this chapter which covered several distinct theories of motivation, I asked myself, where did the energy, the drive, or the direction come from? Being true to myself, the answer was, motivation that came from the social forces that education is required to keep moving up the corporate ladder. I want to be successful and be seen as a motivated person. I also want to prove to myself and others that I take both my education and my career very seriously. According to Maslow, nobody has ever reached the peak of the hierarchy of needs pyramid. We all may strive for it, and some may even get close, but no one has achieved full self-actualization. Self-actualization means a complete understanding of who you are, a sense of completeness, of being the best person you could possibly be. To have achieved this goal is to stop living, for what is there to strive for if you have learned everything about yourself, if you have experienced all that you can, and if there is nothing left for you to grow emotionally, intellectually, or spiritually. Throughout our lives, we work toward achieving the top of the pyramid, self actualization, or the realization of all of our potential. As we move up the pyramid, however, things get in the way which slow us down and often knocks us backward. Imagine in my own life, as I'm working toward the respect and recognition of my colleagues and suddenly finding myself out of work and homeless. Suddenly, my education is not that important anymore. I'm forced backward and can no longer focus my attention on my work or education,