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| Author: Posted: Nov. 17, 2002 | This Page Viewed: 3,840,152 |
Question of the Week: 85 - 11/17/2002 What’s Your Motivation? What motivates you? What is the guiding principle(s) by which you steer your course? The Rede? Freedom and Justice for All? Honor? Kindness? Truth? Have you ever had to wrestle with conflicting impulses or actions that may be contrary to what you hold to be your guide? How did you resolve it? Is there a quotation (or quotations) that best sums up the ideals that you try to live up to or that is your inspiration? Please share it! |
| Reponses: There are 97 responses posted to this question. | Reverse Sort |
| My Motivation | Nov 19th. at 2:23:54 pm EST |
| Charles (Texas) | Age: 39 - Email - Web |
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My motivation in life is to live as mankind was intended to live. To care for Mother Earth and all her children wether they be human, animal, or mineral |
| My Response | Nov 19th. at 12:12:38 pm EST |
| Pluto 6 (Denver, CO) | Age: 40 - Email |
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“To your own self be true.” Shakespeare, I believe, but I don’t know the play… Inner truth, I could call it. It’s been behind some of the more important decisions of my life. The reason that I left the seminary ten years ago was because I honestly could not profess and teach the dogmas and doctrines of the church and remain true to myself and others. My beliefs about life and reality had grown nebulous, and I could not say how things were in such a concrete way. “Nothing has such power to broaden (and deepen) the mind as the ability to investigate systematically and truly all that comes under thy observation in life.” Marcus Aurelius The “and deepen” is my addition. If you honestly hold something as important, then you investigate it, and objectively learn all that you can about it. That holds true for Nature, the bible, spirituality, religion, whatever. I can’t just say that I believe in or have a connection to Nature, and leave it at that. For me, that is a false and shallow way to live. So I learn. I go out and observe. I walk the old trails and grasslands and foothills and keep my eyes and ears open. I focus in on what’s out there. How real for me is some fluffy shallow connection to Nature if I can’t tell Her wrens from Her robins, or Her pronghorns from Her deer? Think of it as a love affair or marriage. I wouldn’t have a deep relationship with someone if I didn’t know anything about that person. If in the course of that relationship I learned something about that other person that would dictate a curtailing of that relationship, then that’s what has to be done. That way I’m true to myself and the other. A thanks to Connections Online Journal, where I saw that Aurelius quote. See the "Additional Link." |
| Just Something As Simple As... | Nov 19th. at 11:18:41 am EST |
| Kalika (Florida) | Age: 16 - Email - Web |
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My motivation is love. Love the Lord and Lady as they love you. Love the earth and all the life that it holds. Love gives me hope, and helps me make decisions every day. I believe that love is the meaning of life, and that the world is a better place for having it. Friendship, compassion, family, passion... kindness of all shapes and sizes. My motivation is as simple as that. :) |
| I Think Don Waterhawk Says It Best | Nov 19th. at 10:54:45 am EST |
| Trish Telesco (Western NY) | Age: 42 - Email - Web |
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that if you can be focused on Honor, Respect and Gratitude all else seems to fall into place. I won't say it's an easy wheel to walk - it requires truthfulness, realness, a prayerful outlook, awakeness... so many things. But when you're motivated by honor, respect isn't that far behind. When you honor something you don't abuse it. With respect, gratitude isn't far behind -- when you respect something, you're thankful for it too! |
| The Pull | Nov 19th. at 4:54:38 am EST |
| Cepherus (Dayton, OH) | Age: 21 - Email |
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My motivation.... good question. Deep inside past feeling and thought there is a place with no discription. No size no color no measure to describe it. I know its there because I feel it. That would be the only way I can describe it. Its a feeling that has no bearing on emotion or thoughts, completly undescribable. Certain times in my life I can feel it. In my youth I felt that it was empty and that explained the sensation and affect it had on me. But later I realized from that place I am being pulled. When thought and feeling fails to be my motivation in life, the pull starts. It starts small and if my actions derive from correct and positive choices it goes away. If it fails it becomes stronger. Sometimes I can only feel it in the quiet of night. If my motivation still ignores the pull, it grows stong. Strong enough to effect my thinking, feeling and perception. The Pull may be a line of fate I am destined to follow. One that grows when I stray from the path. It may be a blessed being or watcher leading me back to the path. But when all is said and done, where my mind and heart fail to motivate me in life, It will always be there. |
| Remember, A Jedi's Strength *flows* From The Force...... | Nov 19th. at 1:06:03 am EST |
| Your Friendly Neighborhood, Ever-Lovin Magic Rat (The Situation Room) | Age: 30 - Email |
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You know, I don't know what to say to this... I know what I know about this... And I know what Lady knows about this... As for what it's meet to say, I *don't* know, But here's a blessing on those who ask the right questions At the right time. Tanachlay. Magic Rat --Don't ask me, Midgarder, I just work here.-- |
| Balance And To Some Degree - Faith | Nov 18th. at 10:43:57 pm EST |
| Holli Shan (Leesburg, VA) | Age: 32 - Email |
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The big motivator for me recently has been to live a balanced life. It's challenging to change from a life of imbalance to balanced, when you have been used to being imbalanced (eating more junk food then what's good for you, not exercising..etc) for so long. You can learn what balance is - but is it ever truly and thoroghly acheived? I guess maybe it is on some days :-). I strive to be balanced and to not let things that I cannot control get me angry or upset (If I can't control what's going on around me - then I don't waste the energy.) The next motivator - is learning to have faith within myself to believe that I am capable of having and living a balanced life. I've never really run into anything that compromised that, or caused me to consciously go against everything I believe in - so I don't have much to say there. I don't really have a quote per se that sums up what motivates me, but I do have a song that helps me when sometimes it's a little harder to be motivated. It's "Solsbury Hill" by Peter Gabriel. It's a song about giving up what you have for what you might or might not get. That's my story and I'm sticking to it! *grin* BB! |
| Treat Each Person As An Individual... | Nov 18th. at 8:27:39 pm EST |
| Yellowwolf (Wayne, MI) | Age: 41 - Email |
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I try to look at the world with an open mind, free to accept or reject anything that comes my way. I keep the following quote from Wallace Stevens close to my heart, because it keeps me from judging others, as they see things from their perspective, not mine: "Twenty men crossing a bridge into a village are twenty men crossing twenty bridges into twenty villages." We all live separate lives, each with our own unique way of viewing the world. Don't reject views because they differ from your own. All we can do is hope we connect with some others as we pass through this life. |
| My Motivation | Nov 18th. at 6:33:53 pm EST |
| Araban MoonPearl (Issaquah, Washington, USA) | Age: 20 - Email - Web |
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Ever since I was a little boy I have felt more at home in nature and with her children than in man's domain. I preferred the company of my dogs over that of others. When I found the craft I felt I had arrived to myself. My motivation in the craft has always been an effort to bring myself closer into nature and to become one with the earth. To strive to unlock the mysteries of nature. |
| Faith | Nov 18th. at 6:08:27 pm EST |
| Storm's Feather (Russellville, Arkansas) | Age: 16 - Email |
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What started my journey on my path was the need to know and understand what i didn't. Everything that i thought was true didn't seem to be, so i decided to search for answers on my own. Being raised an athiest-agnostic, i still have troubles completely believing in anything, so i live a philosophical pattern of belief most of the time. But, i still have that need to understand, and that's what motivates me to believe and live the way i do. "i know a little about a lot, and a lot about a little" Ben Franklin |
| My Motivation | Nov 18th. at 5:13:22 pm EST |
| Starling (Montreal, Canada) | Age: 24 - Email |
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I try to live and let live as much as possible. I don't like people telling me how to act or what to think. I don't like to be attacked on my opinions. And I don't like people attacking others either. I don't follow the Rede to the letter, because if I did, I would never defend myself when being attacked. I embrace the consequences to my actions and I've realized that if I do wrong and I say 'so be it' to the consequences, they are usually not as bad as if I do something nasty and act as though I wasn't responsible for what I have done. But I only fight back if there is no other way. It is my last resort in any case. As for a quotation that I try to live by, here it is: "There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow men. True nobility lies in being superior to your former self." - Elijah Wood |
| Balance And Honor | Nov 18th. at 4:49:03 pm EST |
| Joy (Louisville KY) | Age: 39 - Email |
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I think what motivates me above all other things is the quest for balance in all aspects of life. It's very hard to be balanced, don't you think? For example, when you're irritated at someone, it's hard to examine what you have brought from yourself into that irritation. Honor is very important to me. I find discussions of what individuals believe to be "honorable" actions fascinating. And I guess that, although I do not consider myself "Wiccan," the "an' it harm none, do what ye will" part of the Rede pretty much sums up my guiding principle, since I believe it to be a symbol of balance. As far as impulses that conflict with that, well, if it wasn't hard, it wouldn't be a very good principle, would it? Last, I think the quote that I try to keep in mind comes from my Tarot pamplet, as one of the Divinity meanings of the Chariot: "Greatness can be achieved when mental and physical powers are kept in balance." |
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