The Power of "I Like,"or Why Do People Hate the Idea of Motivation?

When it comes to reaching goals, sticking with habits, and generally being a high achiever, it’s commonly thought that willpower and discipline are the golden keys to success.

But according to recent research studies, the biggest determining factor in whether someone sticks with a pursuit is simply whether or not they enjoy it.

It hardly mattered whether participants thought an activity was important, knew it would garner significant benefits, and felt very committed to it; if they didn’t like doing the thing, they rarely stayed with it. Adherence to an activity hinged on intrinsic motivation — that the day-to-day effort felt satisfying in its own right. The people who were intrinsically motivated toward their pursuits not only were more likely to stick with them, they didn’t have to exercise willpower to do so.

Brett and I cheered these findings, because they provide scientific backing for a gospel we’ve preached for years: motivation trumps discipline. It joins similar evidence of the same truth, such as the fact that people who seem to exercise the most self-control — because they live such orderly, successful, and seemingly temptation-resistant lives — are actually exercising it the least, in part because they like to engage in the virtuous habits they practice. They’re not white-knuckling their adherence to disciplined behaviors; they do it naturally.

One would think that these findings would be cheered not just by us, but broadly. After all, isn’t it heartening that in some sense, fun beats willpower when it comes to getting where we want in life?

And yet, curiously, Brett and I have found that when we’ve talked about the fact that motivation is, if anything, underrated, people aren’t into it. The message doesn’t resonate. It isn’t popular. But, if we talk about how you need discipline, willpower — grit! — people love it. Banging on about discipline is the can’t-miss road to getting lots of likes and thumbs up.

I’ve spent a lot of time pondering this curious paradox, and trying to figure out what accounts for it. I think the phenomenon is multi-layered and runs surprisingly deep.

I’ll attempt to unpack each of the operative layers below.