Reflections on Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation

Keeping motivated can make a big difference in both your personal and professional
lives, but what are the different types of motivation, and is one better than the
other?
by Baron Schwartz � Aug. 22, 18 � Agile Zone � Opinion
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I've learned a lot by reflecting on how I responded to and resisted my father's

parenting. My father used to keep a note in the pocket of his blue work shirt, with
two columns: one of plus signs, one of minuses. He used the columns to score my
behavior and determine whether I had earned privileges and rewards. This did not
have the intended effect.

I had a long history of tension with my father over unfair punishments, but I put
aside my misgivings and tried hard to make it work. As I expected, it became clear
quickly that my father's scoring would be imbalanced. A negative mark was easy to
gain and difficult to prevent, and on some days I received many of them. If my
spoon made a noise against my teeth, I got a negative. If I looked unhappy about
that, I got another; if I protested, yet another. I couldn't avoid negatives, no
matter how hard I tried.

I could offset the negatives by earning positives, so I threw myself into it, going
above and beyond and doing things such as volunteering for chores. But my father
didn't notice, because he was scrutinizing me for imperfections. I tried asking for
a plus sign, but he gave me a minus for asking, � la Oliver Twist.

The minuses accumulated quickly: the column reached the bottom of the page and he
started another next to it, and then another. After many weeks, I had only a few
pluses in the good column. I don't remember what I had to do to earn them, which
feels significant to me now. I remember I once did the day's dishes for my family
of six, and my mother noticed and said I deserved a plus sign. My father demurred:
plus signs were rewards for special efforts. My mother fought with him, pointing
out the asymmetry, but he was unmoved.

I'd been cooperating sincerely in the spirit of giving the system a chance and my
father the benefit of the doubt, but that was the straw that broke the camel's
back. I knew the deck was stacked against me. No matter how hard I tried, playing
by the rules would get me nowhere, and I had no hope of gaining the advantage my
good behavior should have earned me. So I rebelled openly against the scoring
system. This escalated swiftly into severe punishment, but I stubbornly continued
to protest the injustice.

This particular incident wasn't my father's only attempt to figure out how to
control me. He tried many different approaches, all of them fundamentally flawed.
It went in cycles, and the pattern was always the same. He'd explain the new rules
of engagement to me, I'd suspend my doubts and work hard to comply, he'd prove that
the only real rule was that I had to lose, I'd object almost without regard for the
personal consequences, and life would be miserable until my mother intervened
strongly enough to get him to try a different approach.

Recently I've been thinking again about the notebook with pluses and minuses, and
made some progress on understanding better how I responded to my father. A few of
the interesting questions are: why did I initially cooperate, despite all the
history that showed it would turn out the same? Why did I fight so hard in the face
of the terrible consequences when I gave up on cooperation; why didn't I yield to
make it easier on myself? Why did more severe punishments make me more determined
not to surrender? Why did he think his systems would work in the first place? What
part did I play in sustaining the cycle of dysfunction?

What I've realized is that most of my motivation is intrinsic, not extrinsic, and
that an inner reliance on truth is the psychological anchor that helps me weather
the storms of life.

As for why my father thought his systems would work, he was clearly focused on
external motivations � rewards and punishments. I doubt he thought I'd be motivated
much by how I felt about my own conduct. And that's the issue: this assumption is
exactly backward for me. I'm not very motivated by rewards or punishments, I don't
think I ever have been, and I probably never will be. You generally can't make much
progress with me by offering me external incentives, either positive or negative:
promising me rewards, bribing me, shaming me, withholding, threats, and so on.
Those things usually make me much less willing to comply. At the same time, I'm
highly motivated by internal factors. That's why it was so important for me to try
so hard to work within my father's rules, and to be willing to let it begin with
me. Only after a good-faith effort to make it work could I quit in good faith, and
having a clear conscience is a huge motivator for me.

The other big factor was the importance of right and wrong and a correct
understanding of reality. As far back as I can remember, I've been convinced that
justice and truth matter more than a meal or avoiding punishment. And to mouth
words I don't believe, and act out behaviors I disagree with, would divide me
against myself. My brothers and mother urged me to put things into perspective and
stop making my life needlessly hard. But I would not consent to injustice because
it would mean agreeing that wrong was right, and I sensed it would have
consequences for my mental health[1]. It was just wrong, and it was important for
me to be clear on that point.

And did I play a part in the cycle? Yes: I've come to see that switching abruptly
between the extremes of compliance and resistance amplifies repetitive patterns of
behavior, just like setting up a resonance in a mass attached to a spring. But I
long ago learned that I bear responsibility only for my actions, not for my
father's. And I'm under no illusions that I could have changed the outcome
significantly.

My brothers handled the conflicts with my father differently and perhaps more
shrewdly. We all were wounded; we all have recovered in our own ways. Knowing that
I held true to my North Star has been an important part of my own journey out of
that suffering.

As terrible as my relationship with my father was, I have turned some of those

grains of sand into pearls. Today I can be grateful for outcomes such as an ardent
desire to develop relationship skills he lacked; empathy for how terrible it is to
be criticized continually; and conviction that fairness matters. I learned to trust
my judgment and rely on myself; I developed faith in my ability to be disciplined
under duress. I learned to value the means, not just the end. Better to be a nice
guy finishing last than to take an illegitimate shortcut and erode my own
integrity. I learned that true freedom is my ability to choose to respond instead
of react.

Knowing what to look for makes it easy for me to see these patterns and influences
in my life. For example, when the Fedora developers switched the default to a new
version of the Gnome desktop environment, I made a sincere effort to learn how to
use it before I decided to abandon it. Another example: one of the four Core Values
of VividCortex is empathy, which I contrast with the Golden Rule[2]. What makes
work fun for me is growth, impact, and great people. But not everyone values the
same things, so I try hard not to assume.
So many social and legal arrangements offer little beyond extrinsic motivators.
This hints at an unspoken assumption that people are uniformly motivated, and that
rewards and punishments have universal and constant value for all people. For
example, psychologists think people are more motivated to avoid losing something
than they are to gain the same thing. Standard legal and HR practices encode these
types of assumptions: stock options are a "retention" mechanism, a payout for a
confidentiality and nondisparagement agreement is the "consideration" that makes it
binding, and so forth.

Those broad statements and blanket assumptions can sometimes be far from true for
me. I have a strong sense that reducing things to transactions profanes them, but
many social structures are designed to reward people with money and security.
There's no fundamental conflict in this difference, but companies do best when
they're composed of people whose values are at least compatible, if not shared.

Reflecting again on my father, and how I tried to work with him and then fought
him, has reinforced to me the importance of knowing what I need and what drives me.
I long for the sacred. I associate that with simplicity, with stripping to the
essence. Thus I want to do things for their own sake-I aspire to the simplicity of
pure doing, of detachment, of wu wei. This is an integral part of my worldview. I
value the same simplicity and directness in all areas of my life, and the less
separation or partition amongst them, the better.

Things that seem meant to motivate can demotivate me; tactics meant to make me stay
might make me want to leave, and so on. I can examine wide swaths of my life and
see this effect in many places. When motivation wanders close to manipulation, it
can be more than unproductive for me: it can be counterproductive.

Today, I know this idea is supported by an important Buddhist teaching: seeing the
true nature of things is essential to wellbeing.
Imagine the difference if my father had been empathetic and curious enough to
understand why I resisted his systems.