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| "Between Hope and Fear" (1876) by Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema |
Can you describe occasions in your life when you have been motivated by a fear or failure and another in which you have been motivated by the hope of success?
What kind of motivation is more common in your life?
In what ways have your life experience played a role in determining the kind of motivation that is more common in your life?
When I was in elementary school, I was known as “the smart kid” despite never pursuing this title, and I became the standard upon which many of my classmates measured success. Classmates would celebrate for achieving a higher grade than me on an assignment and it did a number on my psyche. I was soon driven by the fear of failure and suffered the stress and worries that came with the need to be spectacular at all times. When I began maturing in junior high and high school, I found that casting my eyes upon the hope of the successes that might result from the effort granted me a much higher level of achievement and success. In essence, the hope of success, which I must clarify is not a blind hope that fails to act, grants the ability to overcome obstacles that seem insurmountable because of your focus on the joys ahead. The fear of failure however, causes even the smallest of difficulties to seem insurmountable for lack of proper expectation.
ReplyDeleteWhen I feel like many people look up to me based on my previous achievements, then I have a much stronger fear of failure. I feel that everyone just "expects" me to have successes in my life, and that if I fail then maybe I'm not that great. Perhaps the only times that I'm motivated by the hope of success is when there's little pressure on me by others (even if that pressure is just in my mind). Essentially, I am motivated by the hope of success when it involves my family and caring for their happiness, but the fear of failure when it involves school and my career.
ReplyDeleteOverall though, I think I also am motivated by success. When my time comes to die, I want to know that I have made the most of my life. I want to know that I have been the best that I could be. I don't believe this is related to motivation through fear, because I am motivated toward these achievements to make myself proud, not to make others proud of me.
DeleteI had an elementary experience much similar to Dylan’s! The only difference was that rather than it being a competition for the class as a whole there was just one girl who thought she always had to do better than me even though I was just doing the best that I could. She even went as far to ask my friends what grades I was making on papers, so she could compare to her own. Everything I did was inadequate in her eyes and she felt the need to surpass me in every project we did. I began to develop this fear that she was in fact better than me in some way and that if I failed to do better than she was then I was not going to be valedictorian someday which was something I had set my hopes on at a very young age. However, as I grew up I realized that no matter what she did I could only do my best and the rest was up to God, and whatever happened was meant to be. I found motivation from within and realized that it was up to me to do my absolute best if I wanted to achieve that goal. Not too long after I stopped worrying about what she did or what grades she made it became evident that I was in fact better in some subjects than she, and vice-versa. We were able to help each other to both succeed, so that we could both reach our goals. By doing so we did both end up being co-valedictorians, and after we settled our differences we were able to do a lot of good in our school organizations by working as a team. Today I have a much more positive outlook and find much more motivation in the hope of success. Do your absolute best and forget the rest is my personal mantra.
ReplyDeleteLike Dylan West, I was motivated most often by the fear of failure in grade school. My fellow classmates held me to a high standard that I thought I had to live up to, which brought upon much stress. I felt that I would no longer be the “smart kid” if I got as much as a bad grade. As I grew older, however, I began to lose the fear of failure and adopted a hope for a successful future. This was my main mindset throughout high-school, especially as the idea of college grew nearer. I will say, though, that the fear of failure will always be slightly present in my life, and in the lives of most people, but the hope of success drives out most of the fear. The more I have succeeded, the easier it is to let go of the fear of failure. After all, failure helps us to learn and is very important in building character, so I have tried to adopt a growth mindset and accept failure when it comes, using it as a positive motivator to give me more hope for success.
ReplyDelete--Haley
I believe that my junior and senior year, I felt both types of motivations at the state cheer competition. As a freshman and sophomore, my squad dropped one stunt and got State Runner-up. Two years in a row we lost something we had because of one mistake. My sophomore year, we lost by a single point. My junior year, I was done losing, as was the rest of my team. We were Washington. We won. We were known for it. We longed for success in a bad way, and we wore shirts to every practice that said “ONE POINT” across the front. That year, we won, and we got the same result my senior year.
ReplyDeleteMy team was equally driven by both fear and hope. I think that’s how it always is for me. No one likes failure. It can lead to good things, but we all try to avoid it. We’d rather reach for success. Both things play an important role in our lives, and we get our fair share of success and failure to keep it going.
I was motivated by fear of failure when I started my first job at age fourteen. My dad had gotten me the job and he told me that I had to work hard and become the best at what I did because I was his daughter and it was expected of me. On the other hand, I was motivated by the hope of success when I took zoology during my first semester of college and changed my major because I felt that I had found something I was good at and that I had a great chance of becoming a nurse. Before I got to college, I think I was more motivated by fears of disappointing my parents and the rest of my family. I even decided to go to college out of fear of failing their expectations. But since I've been on my own, I've been more motivated by hope of success because I've realized that there is no limit to what I can do if I am determined.
ReplyDeleteI have been motivated by both fear and success as I believe that almost anyone has before. My senior year of high school I sent in a tape to the Oklahoma State FFA Convention of me singing. I was motivated by the success I could have. I was motivated by the thought of being on that huge stage and singing in front of close to 13,000 people. I was acepted. I was chosen as one of 6 people to sing at what they call the talent show. My nerves were crazy. At that point I was motivated by fear. No one wants to mess up in front of 13,000 people and I was not an exception. I got up there. I sang half the song and messed up. I recovered very well, but it was still the scariest moment of my life. I ended the song and got the only standing ovation of the night. Everyone came and told me that I did great. No one even noticed I had messed up, but it taught me that I react much much better to the hope of success. I would say that I deal with motivation more towards success than I do towards failure. I also believe it is the way you view it, Instead of me looking and being so motivated by fear I could have switched it around and talked myself up saying that I wanted to be motivated by being the best performance they had ever seen.
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