Lash Yourself to the Mast
on committing to intimidating adventures
[Punchline: Join the Kickstarter for my new book from August 5-26! It features some of the best stories from The Adventures of Blake plus original illustrations, unpublished stories, and poetic life advice for young adults of all ages.]
Some adventures feel effortless—like going for a mountain run on a sunny summer morning.
Some adventures demand a bit of “motivation”—like going for a longer run in less pleasant conditions.
And some adventures will never happen if you don’t commit up front—with consequences for backing out.
Last month I ran 32 sweaty miles in the Tahoe Rim Trail Endurance Runs. I signed up in December, paid $144, and told my friends. Now, I was committed. To back out would involve a financial consequence (no refund), social consequence (explaining myself to my friends), and personal consequence (feeling disappointed).
Back in 2015, my friend Hannah and I ran 32 miles together on the John Muir Trail. No money involved: just two mountain lovers daring each other to dream bigger. If I had backed out of this run, Hannah would have forgiven me, but I still would have suffered a social consequence (her disappointment + possible unwillingness to plan something similar in the future) and personal consequence (letting myself down).
What role do consequences have in “motivation?” Let’s zoom out.
I’m a big believer in intrinsic motivation, self-directed learning, and following one’s interests—all of which should begin in childhood, not age 18, 22, or 65.
A common belief about intrinsic motivation is that it’s about only doing what feels pleasurable in the moment. Someone who relies too much on self-motivation—like an unschooler (i.e., a highly self-directed homeschooler)—therefore won’t attempt anything challenging or requiring deferred gratification.
Sometimes this is true! Many unschoolers don’t like math. It seems irrelevant, it’s difficult, and it’s not required… so why try?
Will some unschoolers miss out on the beauty and utility of math because no one forces them to study it? Sure. Are there also unschoolers for whom math genuinely is a waste of time—and they are spared the grief of being force-fed something their youthful intuition correctly detects to be irrelevant? Undoubtedly. And I would put money on the second group being much larger than the first.
Then there are the unschoolers who end up rapidly educating themselves in math. Perhaps they fall in love with programming or engineering or biology and finally witness math’s purpose. Perhaps they’re preparing to go to a liberal arts college and see that algebra is required. Perhaps they just want to see how they measure up to “normal” 16-year-olds in school. Such young people now have personally meaningful reasons to do something hard—and they gladly enroll in community college, Khan Academy, tutoring, test prep, or another form of traditional, structured learning. I’ve seen it happen over and over again.
Thus do “extrinsic motivators” like tests, grades, comparisons, evaluations, and competitions find a home in the world of self-directed people, young and old.
Self-motivation isn’t a binary. It’s a spectrum.
The widely accepted psychological framework known as “self-determination theory” explains the many flavors of extrinsic motivation.
First, there’s the classic, heavy-handed, external regulation. Imagine a mandatory work seminar without purpose or value. If you don’t attend, you’re punished. Boo!
Next, there are more subtle flavors of extrinsic motivation dealing with ego, social comparison, conditional approval, and identity. These are the messy, overlapping forces known as introjected regulation and identified regulation. A few examples:
When I don’t want to back out of a group adventure, I’m avoiding shame, but I also want to view myself as someone who sticks with hard things.
When I travel the world I’m seeking approval and validation, but I also like the kind of person I become through adventure.
When a 16-year-old wonders if she’s “good at math,” she might be anxiously comparing herself, or mathematical competency may be genuinely important to her identity.
When I want to avoid losing the money I invested in a trail race, my ego and values are both in play.
Finally, with integrated regulation, we wholeheartedly accept entire systems of control in pursuit of greater goals. By enrolling in graduate school, for example, a self-directed learner is actively consenting to some seriously extrinsic motivators: grades, pressure from professors and peers, a thesis defense. This is the “best” kind of extrinsic motivation, because even when the challenge is excruciating, you know it serves a higher purpose.
To be clear: I don’t want to go through life motivated by fear and shame. I want most of my trail runs to be for the joy of trail running. But I recognize that by selectively inviting consequences into my life, I incentivize myself to undertake bigger adventures that offer longer-term emotional resonance.
Homer described this psychology long ago in The Odyssey, in which Odysseus visits the deadly sirens by instructing his sailors exactly where to row and then plugging their ears with wax so they won’t be drawn into the rocks. He orders his men to lash him to the ship’s mast and not untie him, no matter how much he begs.
Lashing yourself to the mast is a classic form of commitment device: a way to commit, ahead of time, to doing something difficult for a greater purpose. By employing such devices I’ve improved my tango, eaten less sugar, and published a website.
I’ve also used crowdfunding platforms (like Kickstarter) to publish three of my four books. In these campaigns, I take people’s money with the promise to deliver a professional-quality book by a certain date. If I don’t deliver, I risk both personal and social consequences. It’s a lot of pressure—but it’s pressure I both want and need to get to the finish line.
All of which is to say: Please join the Kickstarter for my next big writing project, Do What You Love and Die Trying. I’ve put a ton of effort into this little pamphlet-length book, and now it’s ready for the light of day. If you enjoy The Adventures of Blake, I think you’ll love it. This may be your only chance to grab a hard copy.
Onwards!
—Blake
