ambition and work ethic

[MrOrange]

Its kind depressing to have to admit because we largely want to think the best of ourselves but I would definitely say I lack ambition. My work ethic too is something i'm not proud of.

 

I brought this up in therapy. My therapist then asked me about what my parents were like as far as pushing me to do well. In school, I always managed to do well but only because I didn't want to perform poorly...not with the intention to do great. My parents always said that as long as we were happy it doesn't really matter how good/bad we performed in school. So school performance wasn't emphasized at all.

 

When I look back, I always appreciate this aspect of my how parents treated me, but my therapist thinks that them not pushing me to do better likely played a role in my current lack of ambition/work ethic. Are these things innate to certain individuals? Is it learned? Both? Is there a delicate balance in terms of pushing your kid, but not too hard? What does it say about me that I am more motivated by avoiding negative consequences rather than striving to do better for betterment's sake?

 

Currently I work for a company which would not exist if not for the state. I've been there for over 5 years now. I was a minarchist at the time I started, but a struggling one after watching an "open letter to Ron Paul supporters". Once I determined that the dark side wasn't for me, I began to feel lousy about where I was working etc. But that hasn't resulted in me making an effort to find a different job. The reason is that I don't hate it enough. The pay isn't great either. It's like its just not bad enough for me to look for something else. I'm fine with contentment even though I'm capable of doing much better for myself.

 

I also want to point out that I don't feel like a victim about my circumstance. I'm a grown ass man. I own these problems. I just wanted some insight.

 

Some other things:

 

I did go to college, but again, I did just good enough to get by (2.9 GPA). I went to school to become a therapist but after taking this job, I haven't made any attempts at starting my masters. Also, I'd have to re-take some classes to get my GPA up to a 3.5 if I want to get into a program. Pretty demotivating.

 

The state of the economy and the impending collapse is another reason I am using to avoid going back to school or seek another job, but my BA alone isn't sufficient for many descent paying jobs anyway (human development and family studies).

 

Lastly, I have a great support system of friends who know all of this and are always encouraging for me to get active.

 

I didn't want to make it long, but I did want to leave enough detail to get good feedback. Thanks advance for your response(s).

[Elias]

This pretty much describes me too. My brother (at least one of them) is really ambitious, and at least in his case I'd say it's innate in his personality. I just hate doing more than I need to get by, and it feels like adderall would be insanely good for increasing my productivity. I'm one of those people who lay in the bed hungry when I don't have hw or anything like that to do, just because I don't think it's worth hopping on my bike and ride it to dinner a few blocks away, because I am so easily content with my situation, whatever it is.

[CanadianWoodcck]

I don't think the poor economy is the true reason why you lack motivation. I have similar problems, and I can trace them back to how I was treated as a child.

[MrOrange]

I don't think the poor economy is the true reason why you lack motivation. I have similar problems, and I can trace them back to how I was treated as a child.

True. I'm using it as an excuse even though it is a somewhat valid one. I do this in other areas of my life as well. I know that commitment is part of the equation too. I have a hard time with that. If you don't mind, what specifically do you attribute these problems to? Now that you're an adult, what are you doing about this to improve your situation?I'm curious too to hear what people have to say regarding how to instill a good work ethic in your child without force? I would imagine that being an example of a hard working person is one. What else? Is this something that can be overcome in time? Is there a book anyone can recommend?

[CanadianWoodcck]

I recall being motivated when I was younger, but I was unjustly praised by some people in my family, and unjustly criticized by others. I imagine that it really threw off my sense of self. I ended up doing well in school because I thought it would make other people happy. But another reason for any lack of motivation I have is that I don't like working for people who give off mixed messages about expectations. It's really frustrating.

 

I'm trying to improve my situation by working anyway so I can make money and reach my goals. Unfortunately, I'm not really happy at the moment, but I've only been working for a short while, so I don't know what I'm going to do. 

 

I've heard that the book "Getting Things Done" by David Allen is quite good, but I haven't read it yet. 

[Hannibal]

As a resident Ayn Rand cult leader in training, here's a little snippet :

 

 

“Productive work” does not mean the blind performance of the motions of some job. It means the conscious, rational pursuit of a productive career. In popular usage, the term “career” is applied only to the more ambitious types of work; but, in fact, it applies to all work: it denotes a man’s attitude toward his work.

The difference between a career-man and a job-holder is as follows: a career-man regards his work as constant progress, as a constant upward motion from one achievement to another, higher one, driven by the constant expansion of his mind, his knowledge, his ability, his creative ingenuity, never stopping to stagnate on any level. A job-holder regards his work as a punishment imposed on him by the incomprehensible malevolence of reality or of society, which, somehow, does not let him exist without effort; so his policy is to go through the least amount of motions demanded of him by somebody and to stay put in any job or drift off to another, wherever chance, circumstances or relatives might happen to push him.

In this sense, a man of limited ability who rises by his own purposeful effort from unskilled laborer to shop-foreman, is a career-man in the proper, ethical meaning of the word—while an intelligent man who stagnates in the role of a company president, using one-tenth of his potential ability, is a mere job-holder. And so is a parasite posturing in a job too big for his ability. It is not the degree of a man’s ability that is ethically relevant in this issue, but the full, purposeful use of his ability.

 

 

If you've not read any of her work before, I'd strongly recommend it. I think that Atlas Shrugged is a masterpiece. I post the snippet above because in the context of her work in general it implies that you can be gaining pride in yourself - the real source of human happiness - by constantly trying to improve yourself. This productive labour doesn't have to be your job either - you can improve yourself outside of your career, which I think is important to emphasise to people who's short term prospects may be less grand than other's.

 

I also posted the snippet because many people mistakenly thing that Ayn Rand was all about the big industrial powerhouses, and intellectual geniuses, whereas the snippet shows that she didn't really care so much about the degree to which men were productive - only the degree to which they tried and the degree to which they recognised and respected 'better' men's productivity. The characters in Atlas Shrugged are extremes - the heroes are really heroic, and the villains are awful - but it's not meant to be taken literally.