Summary: To overcome procrastination and misuse of time we develop and apply a framework based on reframing of goals to present a more imminent threat. Paradigms are proposed based on the grouping of human drives into 3 catagories: intrinsic motivation, inspiration, and discipline.


Background

There lies in wait for the unaware man a devious and alluring trap: procrastination and the misuse of time. Even to men who understand the immense value of each day, the siren’s call of leisure can often become irresistible, leading to a binge of wasted time and value. We can say that we practice discipline in resisting such temptation, but even so willpower is limited. In this essay we identify methods that overcome the call of procrastination, as well as put them into place and evaluate the framework we’ve created.


Identification of Motivations

First, however, we must discuss the types of motivations that exist in the hearts of men. The driving factors of our desires must be identified and typified before they can be manipulated for our gain. I hypothesize that what drives men to take action can be categorized into 3 groups:

  1. Internal or Intrinsic Motivation – this is the strongest form of motivation and encompasses man’s natural drives: mate posturing, the desire to work to provide for yourself, the drive to satisfy and feed your ego by being ‘better’ than others. These drives are a natural part of human nature and thus are extremely powerful. Almost all people have these motivations which is why almost all people can accomplish self-sustenance (for the most part). I argue here that most external motivations, physical or otherwise, are simply downstream effects of internal motivations, e.g. you read the red pill because you want to be charismatic, because you want to use that charisma to increase your sexual market value.

  2. Extrinsic or Inspirational Motivation – this type of motivation is primarily what you get when you watch fitness videos on YouTube, or log onto the red pill and read a post about how to stop procrastinating. Inspirational motivation is driven by perceived success being wafted under your nose, which sets off a flurry of energy in pursuit of it. You experience the ‘high’ of achieving an end goal without actually doing anything. The salience of the idea of success becomes extremely strong in the moment but wears quickly, as thoughts often do.

  3. Discipline – Rejection of hedonism and immediate pleasure to pursue benefits in the future. Discipline is unique in that it takes energy, as opposed to providing it as the intrinsic and extrinsic motivation do.

Of primary interest here is realizing that instant gratification is only rewarded by the intrinsic and inspirational motivations. Herein lies one of the keys to our problem- discipline is hard to exercise due to the abstraction and intangibility of its benefits.


How Drive Related To Needs and Perceived Threats

The other key can be identified with some simple geometry. The human drives, much like the human needs, are best illustrated as a pyramid which- no surprise- correlates with Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, with which you should all be familiar.

On the bottom of the hierarchy of drives is our intrinsic motivations. It is the most powerful form of drive and commonly compels people to take what would normally be considered insane actions for the sake of their baseline needs: shelter, food, and sex.

Above that is inspirational motivation, a strong tool that correlates strongly with the psychological needs, such as esteem and accomplishment.

At the top of the pyramid is, of course, discipline- the paragon of virtues. Discipline is primarily applied to tasks of self-actualization, where the goals and paths are more abstracted from reality and thus do not pose threats to your basic or psychological needs.

It should be obvious that our motivation to take an action is proportional to the basic needs that are threatened by a lack of action. For example, if you want to start a business but you have a cushy job you love and don’t need the money, then to pursue that avenue would consume a great deal of willpower in the form of discipline. However, if your boss tells you tomorrow that you’re going to be out of a job in 2 weeks, the motivation becomes exponentially more powerful because of the perceived threat. Note that the threat doesn’t even have to be real, but simply perceived as real. This perceived threat is the second key to our manipulating drive.


Discipline As A Finite Resource

Each task or goal that we have will require varying amounts of discipline based on the amount of intrinsic and inspirational motivations involved. As goals become closer to Maslow’s abstracted realm of self-actualization and further from concrete and immediate threats, more discipline will naturally be required.

Manipulation of drive, then, can be adequately summarized as shifting the optimal outcome from a place of self-actualization to a position in which a lack of action raises a perceived threat.

So now we have a framework or paradigm within which to work- great! We can simply apply this framework to real world problems to find solutions and evaluate its validity.


Applying The Framework

Let us take for example the problem of lifting consistently which many men face. First we will identify the immediate threats to our basic and psychological needs raised by inaction, and then we will go from there. Likely most pertinent to the audience is the threat to mating potential, which should be obvious. However, we also find threats to our health and possibly even safety and security. After bringing these threats to light, it is no coincidence that we find that younger men who take the leap to begin lifting do so primarily to increase their SMV, the need (mating) most threatened by inaction. The first step in stimulating your drive to accomplish a goal is to identify the threats of inaction.

If the intrinsic motivations afforded by one’s health and concern for SMV are not sufficient to take action, then discipline will be required. Knowing that exercising our willpower will leave us craving instant gratification, we can now identify a healthy way to quench it. This could entail positive self-affirmations, or simply the conscious recognition of the good that will come down the road from our actions. Thus, the second step in stimulating drive is to use bait to overcome the threshold to actually taking the action.

Importantly, when utilizing self-gratification (or bait), we must avoid unhealthy habits such as eating, bragging or fishing for validation (ever wonder why women post every gym session on Instagram?). These behaviors undermine the long term goals and go against the entire purpose of using discipline as a tool.


Conclusion

Try applying this framework to a problem of motivation that you yourself face:

  1. Honestly and objectively evaluate the negative consequences of inaction. How do these consequences threaten your basic or psychological needs? How will taking action relieve this tension? Keep these thoughts salient in your mind.

  2. If the motivation just isn’t enough, what small bit of instant gratification bait can you use to take the action anyways?


A final note on discipline

My intention with these methods is not to discourage people from exercising willpower. I simply find that it is not possible to paddle through a river of shit with an oar made of a fleeting mental resource. Research in the journals of psychology have reported that with increased use of willpower comes a larger 'reservoir' for use later on.


Thank you for reading. I welcome all feedback and critiques of writing style and content below.

-InvoluntarySickCunt