Motivation : Reflective Essay Samples

People are motivated to do activities by many different factors. Each person is prompted by various influences to complete what they dream of fulfilling. For this paper, I will discuss what motivates me to finish what I set out to do. The main factors that are involved are competition, the desire for achieving greatness, the satisfaction of completing projects, and enjoyment.

Since I am a twin, a sense of competition is hardwired into my brain. Healthy competition can push us to do fantastic things. It makes us strive for a certain goal and gets us to do things faster. However, I do not think competition should become toxic. When anger, frustration, and depression is a result of competition, it is not healthy. Yet, competition can bring about respect, camaraderie, and mutual gain. In the case with my twin brother, we have pushed ourselves to be good at sports, music, school, and even at work. This competitive spirit has leaked into my life without my twin around. In a sense, I replicate my twin brother in other people. I always try to be number one at whatever I do—or at least in the top three. There are times this attitude becomes unhealthy, as I get frustrated if I give everything to a competition or activity and yield mediocre results. But as the years passed, I have gotten better at handling failure and defeat. All in all, I think I finish and do well in many areas of my life for the simple fact that I want to do well in them. Thriving in competition-based environments has made me do well in many tournaments and other events that engage in achieving top places. But, just the feeling of doing well against competent opponents is gratifying.

As I came from a childhood of low self-esteem due to bullying, medical problems, and stigmatization, achieving greatness has always been one of my goals. Like my goal of being in the top places of competitions, the yearning to achieve the heights of a discipline is a way for my self-esteem to get a boost. From a tender age, I wanted to be one of the greats in something: writing, music, sports. I just happen to be a writer now—so, I do my best to attain a high place among people of the written word. It is difficult to say, though, who will be labeled as “great” or “major” in the annals of history. Most famous writers die and then they became renowned worldwide. There are rare occasions when writers are famous in their lifetimes and much after. However, by the work I do, I hope that one day, my poems, essays, and stories will be in textbooks for school and I will be named as a “major poet” and such. Though I mostly write for the enjoyment of it, this concept of being remembered long after I have passed does have a potent motivating factor.

Besides wanting to be remembered and to show well at competitions, I also revel in the feeling of completing an important project. For instance, last year, I finished a poetry collection with my late father’s poems and my own poems. It was a tribute to him and his work. In a way, I felt that his death was not in vain and that his work was validated even more through this compilation. It is hard to describe the moment of knowing when such a prominent project is set to rest: it is almost like you are ready to die. You sense that a chapter of your life has closed and you are now a new person. These deep sentiments motivate me to complete projects on a regular basis.

The last, and most simple, factor that motivates me to do something is enjoyment. There are people who do activities they do not enjoy for decades. I am not one of those people. I can work on tasks I do not like for a while, but in the end, my main focus should be on something that I enjoy. If I find joy in doing a certain work, I engage in it for a large part of the day, or even all day without tiring. Tiredness in most cases, in my life, is due to a lack of enjoyment in the work being done.

Each person has his or her own motivating factors. For me, it happens to be competition, a desire for greatness, a want to complete projects, and enjoyment. I hope this reflection has allowed you to delve deeper into your true nature.

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