Transcript: Episode 0095

WEBVTT

00:00:37.392 --> 00:00:39.712
Welcome to the Stone Choir Podcast.

00:00:39.712 --> 00:00:40.752
I am Corey J.

00:00:40.752 --> 00:00:41.832
Mahler.

00:00:41.832 --> 00:00:43.972
And I'm still, whoa.

00:00:43.972 --> 00:00:48.612
On today's Stone Choir, we're going to be discussing purpose and motivation.

00:00:48.612 --> 00:00:55.712
We're going to be tying these concepts into duty, which kind of dominated last year's episodes of Stone Choir.

00:00:55.712 --> 00:00:58.272
We want to make sure that we give you an episode.

00:00:58.272 --> 00:00:59.652
This is going to be a short one.

00:00:59.652 --> 00:01:20.632
If we succeed, this will probably be about an hour, because one of the points we want to make today is that there's not actually a lot to say about this, but we think it's really important to get it on the record, just so that guys have a framework to think about some of these things systematically, instead of just being random about the duties that you learn about, and then the purposes you assume and motivation for those.

00:01:20.632 --> 00:01:23.152
So we're going to describe how those things interplay.

00:01:23.152 --> 00:01:26.732
I apologize that we didn't have an episode the last two weeks in a row.

00:01:26.732 --> 00:01:28.592
We wanted to, we intended to.

00:01:28.592 --> 00:01:37.152
This is the third week that I prepared to do this episode, and a bunch of other stuff just went completely haywire and wasn't able to get it done, so I apologize.

00:01:37.152 --> 00:01:47.172
If you're listening from the future and you're marathoning as we intend, you know, we want to make our episodes worthy of revisiting, then you didn't miss out, have any disappointment.

00:01:48.472 --> 00:01:57.212
When we talk about duty in some of the episodes that we do, we focus on that specifically, we're always talking about duties from God.

00:01:57.212 --> 00:02:00.212
Not all duty necessarily flows directly from God.

00:02:01.112 --> 00:02:13.332
So, the things we're going to say today about duty and motivation and purpose, it may well be that it has nothing moral to it, but this is how it's going to work whenever these things are assumed.

00:02:13.332 --> 00:02:22.652
So, I'm going to give a definition here that's not intended to be a fiddly etymological point, not trying to narrow this down, that purpose only means one thing.

00:02:22.652 --> 00:02:26.772
I just want to tell you what I mean when we're saying it today.

00:02:26.772 --> 00:02:28.652
Duty is kind of the universal.

00:02:28.752 --> 00:02:36.892
It's the concept of there's this thing floating around out there that exists, that fits for some purpose in some life somehow.

00:02:36.892 --> 00:02:47.572
And then, for the purpose of our discussion today, pardon the reuse of the word, purpose is the adoption of that universal in your particular circumstances.

00:02:47.572 --> 00:02:50.552
So, you're just basically taking a duty and making it part of your life.

00:02:50.552 --> 00:02:52.152
That's what purpose means.

00:02:52.152 --> 00:02:54.752
And again, there are other definitions and some of them overlap with that.

00:02:54.752 --> 00:02:57.492
But as we're talking about today, it's limited to that.

00:02:58.052 --> 00:03:04.412
So, just keep in mind, purpose is duty adopted for a person in their own life.

00:03:04.412 --> 00:03:07.912
It's your particular version of the duty.

00:03:07.912 --> 00:03:09.612
It's basically the same thing.

00:03:09.612 --> 00:03:11.432
It's a philosophical concept.

00:03:11.432 --> 00:03:13.892
You have the universal and then the particular.

00:03:13.892 --> 00:03:16.732
So, your particular purpose is going to be the same as the duty.

00:03:16.732 --> 00:03:19.332
It's not some variation on the theme even.

00:03:19.332 --> 00:03:22.012
It's just that you have chosen to make it yours.

00:03:22.012 --> 00:03:27.092
And that's one of the reasons that we think this is worth discussing today is that that needs to be a conscious process.

00:03:27.332 --> 00:03:31.112
You have to actually think about, okay, I've learned about some duty.

00:03:31.112 --> 00:03:32.572
Does it have anything to do with me?

00:03:32.572 --> 00:03:35.572
If it does, then you make it your purpose.

00:03:35.572 --> 00:03:40.212
And then, having made it your purpose through an intellectual process, maybe it's very brief.

00:03:40.212 --> 00:03:45.072
There are a number of guys who said that they've listened to some episode of Stone Choir and something just clicked.

00:03:45.072 --> 00:03:48.552
And suddenly, they realized that they had these duties that they didn't know they had before.

00:03:48.552 --> 00:03:53.912
And so, something changed in their life because they adopted whatever it was that they heard as their purpose.

00:03:53.912 --> 00:03:55.232
That can happen from anywhere.

00:03:55.292 --> 00:04:01.852
Like, you should be very careful about your inputs because you don't want to just be randomly collecting purposes from all over the place.

00:04:01.852 --> 00:04:03.272
That's not healthy or good.

00:04:03.272 --> 00:04:10.992
This is something that should be rare because the purpose is going to stick with you for years, for an era, maybe for the rest of your life.

00:04:10.992 --> 00:04:14.812
You know, when you're assuming some duty, some of those are completely permanent.

00:04:14.812 --> 00:04:18.572
When you become a husband, you become a father, that should be permanent.

00:04:18.572 --> 00:04:22.052
There's no get out of jail free card for that because it's not a jail, it's a duty.

00:04:22.472 --> 00:04:25.552
It's something you just, you got to do from now on.

00:04:25.552 --> 00:04:28.672
So you don't want to be casual about assuming those purposes.

00:04:28.672 --> 00:04:37.592
But even then, once you say, okay, I want to do this, I've decided I want to baptize my kids, I've decided I want to join a church, whatever, it could be any number of things.

00:04:37.592 --> 00:04:42.832
Once you make that your purpose, that's still just an intellectual process.

00:04:42.832 --> 00:04:55.072
And that's part of the warning of this episode, is that, as I originally conceived this episode a few weeks ago, the idea was that we would try to be encouraging, try to be motivating and say, okay, you got all these general duties floating around in your head.

00:04:55.072 --> 00:04:56.912
What do you actually do with them?

00:04:56.912 --> 00:05:03.892
And we want to exhort you, the listener, to whatever duties you feel you have from God, to stick with them.

00:05:03.892 --> 00:05:15.172
As I was thinking about it, I realized that motivational speaking is almost actually an oxymoron, because a motivational speaker can get you fired up for an evening or something, give you some emotional high.

00:05:16.452 --> 00:05:26.492
But whatever information you receive in that learning, the only way you keep it going in your life is if you are internally motivated.

00:05:26.492 --> 00:05:28.752
And that's the third part of the spectrum.

00:05:28.752 --> 00:05:35.352
So you have the universal duty, you have the particular adoption for your purpose, and then the motivation is the work.

00:05:35.352 --> 00:05:37.952
It's what keeps you going every day.

00:05:37.952 --> 00:05:43.832
And the distinction between motivation and purpose is that oftentimes motivation is not really rational at all.

00:05:44.452 --> 00:05:48.252
It may well be almost entirely emotional, and that's fine.

00:05:48.252 --> 00:05:55.372
That's kind of an odd thing for me to be saying, because that's kind of the last place that I typically go in my life or talk about to other people.

00:05:55.372 --> 00:05:59.432
But the reality is the motivation is not an intellectual process.

00:05:59.432 --> 00:06:03.092
The motivation is going to be different for different people.

00:06:03.092 --> 00:06:10.372
Maybe it's pure stubbornness, maybe it's anger, maybe it's enthusiasm and optimism, maybe it's fear.

00:06:10.372 --> 00:06:11.432
That's kind of a bad one.

00:06:11.732 --> 00:06:20.852
But whatever motivates you is the thing that's going to keep you moving, keep you fighting towards your purpose, keep you working.

00:06:20.852 --> 00:06:23.592
Because the day-to-day process is not thinking.

00:06:23.592 --> 00:06:27.212
That's the trap that we want to make sure the guys don't fall into.

00:06:27.212 --> 00:06:28.672
So much of this is about thinking.

00:06:28.772 --> 00:06:30.072
A podcast is entirely thinking.

00:06:30.072 --> 00:06:36.412
You're downloading thoughts from two guys on the internet, you listen for a couple hours, and you move on with your life.

00:06:36.412 --> 00:06:44.192
If you pluck something from that and say, okay, this is my purpose, then you're going to do some more thinking about it and figure out how it applies to your life.

00:06:44.192 --> 00:06:47.632
Again, wherever the purpose is coming from, it's not about us.

00:06:47.632 --> 00:06:50.412
You find some purpose, you make it your own.

00:06:50.412 --> 00:06:54.992
And then the motivation is what keeps you sticking to doing that thing.

00:06:54.992 --> 00:07:03.832
And the reason for highlighting these three distinct things is that, not that you should be thinking about them all the time, but you should have thought about it once or twice.

00:07:03.832 --> 00:07:06.452
Maybe you check in periodically with your own life.

00:07:06.832 --> 00:07:10.652
Whatever purposes you have, are they still good purposes?

00:07:10.652 --> 00:07:17.512
Maybe there's something that you did for a period of time in your life, and now you realize that that's no longer a fulfilling purpose.

00:07:17.512 --> 00:07:20.332
Maybe you set it aside and move on to something else.

00:07:20.332 --> 00:07:29.072
Maybe you have purposes that you know are good, because they're duties that are, you know, maybe godly duties, so you don't just want to set those aside.

00:07:29.072 --> 00:07:31.712
But maybe you need to stoke the fires of your motivation.

00:07:31.712 --> 00:07:35.452
Maybe you realize that you're losing motivation for whatever your purpose is.

00:07:36.092 --> 00:07:43.332
It's really a meta-episode talking about thinking about thinking, and we don't want that to be off-putting, so we're going to keep it short, because there's not a ton to say.

00:07:43.332 --> 00:07:47.552
But again, if you don't think about it very deliberately, I've never thought about this in my own life.

00:07:47.552 --> 00:07:58.752
Like, I've done these things at various times, but until I was thinking about this episode, I'd never been really systematic about thinking of the process of, okay, what does this have to do with me?

00:07:58.752 --> 00:08:02.432
And we talk a lot about the and then of the Christian life.

00:08:02.432 --> 00:08:04.492
This is kind of the and then of duty.

00:08:05.092 --> 00:08:07.712
You learn about something, that's information.

00:08:07.712 --> 00:08:11.432
You think about it, you say, okay, I want that to be my purpose.

00:08:11.432 --> 00:08:12.612
That's still more information.

00:08:12.612 --> 00:08:15.072
It's still a thought process.

00:08:15.072 --> 00:08:17.752
And then the doing is the work.

00:08:17.752 --> 00:08:19.992
And that's the part that you can't get on the internet.

00:08:19.992 --> 00:08:21.752
There's no talking in the working.

00:08:21.752 --> 00:08:27.972
The working, the doing, the daily grind, the showing up every day, that's where the motivation comes in.

00:08:27.972 --> 00:08:39.512
And if you don't have all three of those, if you don't have some duty that you assume is a purpose, so you're just either doing nothing or you're doing random things, you're kind of listless, you're kind of making a mess of your life.

00:08:39.512 --> 00:08:45.632
Or if you assume a bunch of purposes and you don't have any follow through, you have no motivation, you never get anything done.

00:08:45.632 --> 00:08:50.652
And that's unfulfilling, it's unpleasant, you're not going to be happy, you're not going to be productive.

00:08:50.652 --> 00:08:58.012
And so just a little bit of thought about it, maybe all it takes to structure some small part of your life so that you can keep going.

00:08:58.012 --> 00:09:04.452
That's ultimately the reason we wanted to do this episode because as I said, we talk a lot about duty, but it's theory.

00:09:04.452 --> 00:09:10.092
That's just you're downloading ideas from the internet, you listen, you set aside, you move on.

00:09:10.092 --> 00:09:11.332
If that's all it is, that's fine.

00:09:11.332 --> 00:09:14.772
We're not telling anyone what they must do or should do necessarily.

00:09:14.772 --> 00:09:19.612
Although when we're talking about God's things, that exhortation should be from God.

00:09:19.612 --> 00:09:24.692
But your motivation is not going to be because some guy on a podcast told you to do something.

00:09:24.692 --> 00:09:31.312
Your motivation is your personal commitment to the purpose, which is coming from wherever the duty flows.

00:09:31.312 --> 00:09:35.252
And no duties flow from us, for example, because we have no authority.

00:09:35.252 --> 00:09:38.032
We can't give anybody any duty to do anything.

00:09:38.032 --> 00:09:44.412
When you assume a duty, make it a purpose, your motivation is going to be a very personal thing.

00:09:44.412 --> 00:09:46.672
And so you'll have to tend to that yourself.

00:09:46.672 --> 00:09:56.652
We'll talk a little bit about some examples, but in your daily life, what keeps you moving is really in a way the most important thing, because that's where it all actually happens.

00:09:57.232 --> 00:10:05.132
And we don't want guys to constantly be in the state of just thinking and thinking and ruminating and discussing and debating, and it's just, it's endless.

00:10:05.132 --> 00:10:12.012
It ends up just being, it's a circular process that goes nowhere, that's useless at some point.

00:10:12.012 --> 00:10:16.572
You do it for a little bit, you get it done, you make your decision, and then you do the work.

00:10:16.572 --> 00:10:28.052
So with this framework, I think that hopefully will help some people to take stock of what it is that you want to do with your life and see how you're doing it.

00:10:28.052 --> 00:10:36.092
And if you need to make changes or tweaks to it, I think it's worth thinking about things in this way, just so you don't miss anything, because that's easy.

00:10:36.092 --> 00:10:41.992
Unexamined priors, things that we don't think about, are usually where a lot of the bugs are hiding.

00:10:41.992 --> 00:10:53.212
So as Will mentioned in his opening, a lot of times when we're speaking about duty, obviously we are speaking about the things of God, because ultimately all duties are owed to God.

00:10:53.852 --> 00:11:04.172
They are typically mediated, as it were, because you typically owe your duty to some person, your neighbor, your wife, your children, whomever it happens to be.

00:11:04.172 --> 00:11:06.672
But the ultimate duty is owed to God.

00:11:06.672 --> 00:11:14.052
In this episode, we're not speaking about that so much, so maybe the end of Ecclesiastes may have come to mind for you.

00:11:14.052 --> 00:11:18.452
And that is, in the ultimate sense, man's duty, man's purpose.

00:11:18.452 --> 00:11:20.532
The end of the matter all has been heard.

00:11:20.532 --> 00:11:24.572
Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.

00:11:24.572 --> 00:11:28.232
And that is your duty, and so intellectually you know that.

00:11:28.232 --> 00:11:29.412
You make it your purpose.

00:11:29.412 --> 00:11:31.952
That's an important thing as a Christian.

00:11:31.952 --> 00:11:42.392
But we're speaking about how you actually go about doing that in your life, because if that's your duty and your purpose, well, how do you do it?

00:11:43.512 --> 00:11:50.032
It's the other purposes in life that help you to fulfill what God has commanded you to do, what God has made you to do.

00:11:50.752 --> 00:11:55.632
And then, as Woe said, the motivation, you can think of it as the fire that drives the engine.

00:11:55.632 --> 00:11:57.892
And it's going to be different for different men.

00:11:57.892 --> 00:12:04.992
Not every man is going to be able to motivate himself, because again, motivation is largely an internal matter.

00:12:04.992 --> 00:12:08.632
But not every man will be able to motivate himself in the same way.

00:12:08.632 --> 00:12:16.312
It's going to depend on you personally, your personal disposition, and a lot of other factors that will go into that.

00:12:16.312 --> 00:12:31.152
But if your purpose, your goal, as it were, is to get healthy, to lose some weight, to gain more muscle mass, whatever it happens to be, different men are going to find different ways to motivate themselves to get that done.

00:12:31.152 --> 00:12:38.792
And the motivation is what drives you to do it, because simply having the purpose is important, but it's not sufficient.

00:12:38.792 --> 00:12:55.012
Because if you just have the purpose, if you just think, I need to lose weight, and then you never do anything because you lack the motivation, the purpose doesn't matter, because really you haven't done anything with that purpose, you haven't followed through.

00:12:55.012 --> 00:12:58.732
You may think of one of the parables in Matthew.

00:12:58.732 --> 00:13:01.812
I'll actually just read through the parable, it's just a paragraph.

00:13:01.812 --> 00:13:02.852
What do you think?

00:13:02.852 --> 00:13:08.692
A man had two sons, and he went to the first and said, Son, go and work in the vineyard today.

00:13:08.692 --> 00:13:10.892
And he answered, I will not.

00:13:10.892 --> 00:13:13.732
But afterward, he changed his mind and went.

00:13:13.732 --> 00:13:16.432
And he went to the other son and said, The same.

00:13:16.432 --> 00:13:19.852
And he answered, I go, sir, but did not go.

00:13:19.852 --> 00:13:22.812
Which of the two did the will of his father?

00:13:22.812 --> 00:13:32.232
And we all know, of course, the one who did the will of his father is the one who went and actually worked in the field, not the one who simply said, I will go.

00:13:32.232 --> 00:13:38.112
Because there's a difference between having the purpose and actually following through, actually doing it.

00:13:38.112 --> 00:13:40.232
You need that motivation.

00:13:40.232 --> 00:13:42.972
Incidentally, men can help motivate each other.

00:13:43.432 --> 00:13:46.972
That's why I said, it's not entirely an internal matter.

00:13:46.972 --> 00:13:51.312
A particular news story from some years ago comes to mind.

00:13:51.312 --> 00:13:55.592
There was, I believe, he was a chef who had quite a bit of weight to lose.

00:13:55.592 --> 00:14:06.092
And every single day, for months, his friend texted him in the morning, just basically the word fatty, not quite in such polite terms, but he texted him fatty.

00:14:06.092 --> 00:14:09.852
And that helped motivate him to lose that weight.

00:14:09.852 --> 00:14:11.552
So men can motivate each other.

00:14:11.652 --> 00:14:18.312
You can help your brothers keep their motivation up to get done whatever it is they need to do.

00:14:18.312 --> 00:14:23.172
Of course, all of the men listening who go to the gym with friends know this.

00:14:23.172 --> 00:14:27.992
Part of that motivation can be that you have others who are going to the gym with you.

00:14:27.992 --> 00:14:32.552
The same thing is true if you have some other group that does some activity.

00:14:32.552 --> 00:14:38.712
But you have that purpose and then you translate it into action by using that motivation.

00:14:38.712 --> 00:14:42.252
And so you have to keep that motivation high, as Woe was saying.

00:14:42.252 --> 00:14:46.992
That is going to be different for different men, how you keep your motivation high.

00:14:46.992 --> 00:15:02.132
Part of that will probably be taking some breaks, which is something that is perhaps a little unnatural for American ears to some degree, because we have a reputation in the US of being workaholics, which is not necessarily good.

00:15:02.132 --> 00:15:04.572
In fact, it is typically bad.

00:15:04.572 --> 00:15:07.512
Part of keeping that motivation high is not burning out.

00:15:08.772 --> 00:15:13.532
If you burn out, you're not going to achieve the purpose, because you have destroyed your motivation.

00:15:13.532 --> 00:15:15.772
That's what you've done in a burnout.

00:15:15.772 --> 00:15:18.632
And so taking breaks is also part of this.

00:15:18.632 --> 00:15:21.572
There's a reason that God instituted the Sabbath.

00:15:21.572 --> 00:15:24.652
He instituted the Sabbath for man.

00:15:24.652 --> 00:15:30.372
That is why he created it, because you do actually need a rest from time to time.

00:15:30.372 --> 00:15:33.992
You cannot just go at 100% all of the time.

00:15:33.992 --> 00:15:35.052
You will burn out.

00:15:35.632 --> 00:15:44.032
You will lose your motivation, and then you will fail at achieving whatever purpose you had that required that motivation.

00:15:44.032 --> 00:15:49.892
And to make sure that we're clear, we're not saying you have to have one purpose in life, because obviously not.

00:15:49.892 --> 00:15:51.592
You can have a number of purposes.

00:15:51.592 --> 00:16:01.952
If you are a husband and a father, part of your purpose, one of your core purposes, of course, is going to be caring for your wife and children, caring for your family.

00:16:01.952 --> 00:16:02.852
That's how it should be.

00:16:03.652 --> 00:16:05.932
But you also have a job.

00:16:05.932 --> 00:16:07.872
You have some occupation.

00:16:07.872 --> 00:16:11.332
Doing that well is another purpose in your life.

00:16:11.332 --> 00:16:14.492
And you have other purposes in other places.

00:16:14.492 --> 00:16:18.532
If you're an elder in your church, that's part of your purpose.

00:16:18.532 --> 00:16:25.592
And you will have different motivations, perhaps overlapping but different, for these different purposes.

00:16:25.592 --> 00:16:32.172
And as Wo was saying, there's no such thing really as a true motivational speaker, because we can't motivate you.

00:16:33.312 --> 00:16:39.752
Because, again, motivation is largely internal but certainly personal.

00:16:39.752 --> 00:16:51.672
And even in the cases where someone else can help motivate you to some degree, unless it's someone who is an important and consistent part of your life, it's going to be transitory.

00:16:51.672 --> 00:17:00.152
If we manage to motivate you in some way with what we say here or some other episode, you still have to internalize that and keep it going.

00:17:00.252 --> 00:17:03.812
You have to stoke and feed that fire.

00:17:03.812 --> 00:17:05.072
We can't do that for you.

00:17:05.072 --> 00:17:11.952
No one else can do that for you, because motivation is a matter of the will and of desire.

00:17:11.952 --> 00:17:14.412
It's not just rational, as Woe was saying.

00:17:14.412 --> 00:17:17.612
It is also emotional and these other things.

00:17:17.612 --> 00:17:20.392
You have to keep that fire burning.

00:17:20.392 --> 00:17:28.492
That's part of what it means to actually live your life as a man in this world, to achieve those purposes, to fulfill those duties.

00:17:29.032 --> 00:17:33.672
You cannot do them without motivation, so it is centrally important.

00:17:33.672 --> 00:17:37.352
And again, you have to do that yourself.

00:17:37.352 --> 00:17:45.552
You're not going to find your motivation via a podcast or some book or anything like that.

00:17:45.552 --> 00:17:56.232
You can find, or at least you can start to discover, purpose in those places, because someone can explain something to you and go, I recognize that, that's something important.

00:17:57.292 --> 00:17:59.192
That should be a purpose in my life.

00:17:59.192 --> 00:18:09.012
And so, for instance, if you were not a Christian at some point in your life, and you became a Christian, well, that's given you a particular purpose.

00:18:09.012 --> 00:18:13.032
The motivation did not come along with that purpose for free.

00:18:13.032 --> 00:18:20.232
The motivation is something that is, it's attached to it and related, but you still have to keep it burning.

00:18:20.232 --> 00:18:21.972
The same thing with a family.

00:18:21.972 --> 00:18:23.892
That's perhaps one of the best examples.

00:18:24.852 --> 00:18:28.532
Because, by and large, that comes with the motivation.

00:18:28.532 --> 00:18:31.372
That is a case where the motivation comes alongside the purpose.

00:18:31.372 --> 00:18:33.812
You sort of get it for free.

00:18:33.812 --> 00:18:36.512
But you still have to keep at it.

00:18:36.512 --> 00:18:40.012
You have to do your duty, but these terms are obviously related.

00:18:40.012 --> 00:18:41.212
There's some overlap.

00:18:41.212 --> 00:18:44.892
But how you're doing that is you're keeping that motivation day in and day out.

00:18:44.892 --> 00:18:48.692
And again, yes, you have to take breaks from time to time so you don't burn out.

00:18:48.692 --> 00:19:01.572
But with a family, because of the way that God has constructed human beings, because of the way that He has designed men, if you have a wife and children, you have that natural motivation to care for them.

00:19:01.572 --> 00:19:03.712
But you still have to feed that fire.

00:19:03.712 --> 00:19:06.672
You have to make sure that it doesn't wane over time.

00:19:06.672 --> 00:19:08.772
It doesn't start to burn out.

00:19:08.772 --> 00:19:13.032
That is part of what it means to live an actual human life in this world.

00:19:13.032 --> 00:19:20.632
And we're talking about the things of this world, because that ultimate purpose from Ecclesiastes, that's important.

00:19:21.352 --> 00:19:23.852
But this is the how you do it in this life.

00:19:23.852 --> 00:19:32.092
You do it by having purposes in this life, and then following through with the motivation to achieve those things.

00:19:32.092 --> 00:19:43.472
So as I said earlier, one of the tricky parts about men thinking about their own purposes and thinking about duty in general is the tar pit of thinking for its own sake.

00:19:43.472 --> 00:19:45.412
And that's useful to a point.

00:19:45.412 --> 00:19:54.792
As I said, I thought three weeks in a row for many, many hours about this episode, and kind of iterated through the process of what I wanted to say.

00:19:54.792 --> 00:20:11.832
I'm kind of glad that it took three weeks, because the third week, this week, Sunday and yesterday, as I was preparing, and we're recording on Wednesday, so Tuesday as well, for the first time, I actually looked up in the Bible how purpose was used in the Old and New Testament, looking at the same Greek word.

00:20:11.832 --> 00:20:18.572
And something struck me about the way it was translated that actually changed the way I wanted to talk about this today.

00:20:19.292 --> 00:20:32.292
And I'm not making a fiddly etymological point here, and I also want to emphasize that one of the reasons we're not talking a ton about the Bible today is that it's really pernicious for guys to think that they have to have a Bible verse for everything.

00:20:32.292 --> 00:20:36.852
Other great examples in the Bible of some of these things, they're examples.

00:20:36.852 --> 00:20:44.952
But what we're talking about here is kind of the mechanical premise of how this stuff will always work, regardless of where the duty comes from.

00:20:44.952 --> 00:20:58.632
Typically, we talk about certain vocations, having duties associated with them, like police, firefighters, medical soldiers, people who are responding to emergencies to some degree.

00:20:58.632 --> 00:21:01.292
They're considered to be on duty.

00:21:01.292 --> 00:21:04.312
And so those are opt in vocations.

00:21:04.312 --> 00:21:09.592
Those people, typically men, they should be men, are opting in to making that their purpose.

00:21:09.592 --> 00:21:21.112
And then once you have made the duty to respond to a fire or to respond to a call to war, you've made that your purpose, then you do have a moral obligation to follow through.

00:21:21.112 --> 00:21:22.992
Because you're the one who's on duty.

00:21:22.992 --> 00:21:31.732
You know, if you're a police officer assigned to a certain zone for an evening on patrol, and a dispatcher calls, you have a duty to answer that call.

00:21:32.072 --> 00:21:38.412
The dispatcher isn't senior to you, but they're still giving you orders because they're going to say, you need to go over here and respond to this.

00:21:38.412 --> 00:21:40.772
You don't get to say, no, I don't feel like it.

00:21:40.772 --> 00:21:44.192
You have a duty to respond, because you're in that place to do that.

00:21:44.252 --> 00:21:47.352
And if you can't do it, you shouldn't have been there.

00:21:47.352 --> 00:21:55.612
So duty is implicitly moral until you adopt it, but then there is a degree of morality.

00:21:55.612 --> 00:22:01.272
Because if you choose anything to be your purpose and other people depend on you, then you're on the hook.

00:22:01.272 --> 00:22:12.052
And you're on the hook to God, because if people are depending on you and you don't do your duty, if you're derelict in your duty, people can get hurt in those situations.

00:22:12.052 --> 00:22:13.452
Maybe it's not the case for other things.

00:22:13.492 --> 00:22:28.012
You know, if you happen to be on call for tech support or something, you have the page or whatever they do now, notifications, people aren't going to die if they can't check their email at 3 in the morning, but you're still on call for that.

00:22:28.012 --> 00:22:36.772
You opt into that, and once you opt in and say, this is my purpose, then there is a degree of attachment, but you have a choice not to opt in to some of those things.

00:22:36.772 --> 00:22:42.152
There are other things where, you know, when it's a duty from God, you should be pursuing it.

00:22:42.312 --> 00:22:51.772
You know, if you're a young man listening, you don't have a duty yet as a husband or a father, God willing, you will have those duties someday, hopefully soon.

00:22:51.772 --> 00:22:53.972
And until that day, you have other duties.

00:22:53.972 --> 00:22:57.992
You have other things that you should make your purpose.

00:22:57.992 --> 00:23:11.012
And one of the things that guys need to understand about girls is that, you know, oftentimes it's said that women are attracted to ambition, and there are some girls who are attracted specifically to ambitious men.

00:23:11.672 --> 00:23:16.512
But I think more generally, girls are repulsed by a man who has no purpose.

00:23:16.512 --> 00:23:19.772
If you are completely purposeless, it's off-putting.

00:23:19.772 --> 00:23:21.812
You come across as a loser.

00:23:21.812 --> 00:23:25.892
And it doesn't even necessarily matter if your purpose is super ambitious.

00:23:25.892 --> 00:23:29.012
You don't need to be the best in the world at whatever.

00:23:29.012 --> 00:23:30.532
You just have to want to do something.

00:23:30.532 --> 00:23:32.432
You have to be driven by something.

00:23:32.432 --> 00:23:35.252
And that is what girls are going to tend to find attractive.

00:23:35.252 --> 00:23:38.352
Some will also want the very best, but whatever.

00:23:38.352 --> 00:23:40.132
Most girls just want to see you want to do something.

00:23:40.752 --> 00:23:44.372
So part of getting a girl is having some purpose.

00:23:44.372 --> 00:23:45.972
It has nothing to do with getting girls.

00:23:45.972 --> 00:23:48.092
You have to have some purpose in your life.

00:23:48.092 --> 00:23:49.832
We can't tell you what that's going to be.

00:23:49.832 --> 00:23:53.092
And it may not be the purpose for your entire life.

00:23:53.092 --> 00:23:59.372
It may just be something, I'm going to do this, I'm going to try it, I'm going to work hard at it, I'm going to pour myself into it.

00:23:59.372 --> 00:24:02.152
Maybe it works out, maybe you decide it's not for you, that's fine.

00:24:02.152 --> 00:24:05.692
You're not betraying anything by saying, okay, I want a different purpose now.

00:24:06.592 --> 00:24:12.232
But lacking that is lacking something about being a man.

00:24:12.232 --> 00:24:22.972
I was saying earlier, when I looked at scripture to see how the word purpose was used, what I found was that in the Old Testament, when the same Greek word is used, it's usually translated as thought.

00:24:22.972 --> 00:24:32.892
And that made me realize something that's I think important for this is that thought itself really means to almost diametrically oppose things at the same time.

00:24:33.272 --> 00:24:36.012
It's one word used in two very different ways.

00:24:36.012 --> 00:24:39.372
So the first type of thought is rumination.

00:24:39.372 --> 00:24:43.372
It's basically what I did in preparation for this episode several weeks in a row.

00:24:43.372 --> 00:24:53.512
I ruminated on all these ideas, just molded over, chewed it over, chewed it like cud in my mind to sort of find what it was that I wanted to say.

00:24:53.512 --> 00:24:56.292
That doesn't go anywhere or do anything by itself.

00:24:56.292 --> 00:25:03.312
And the trap that a lot of guys fall into when you're downloading podcasts or reading articles or whatever, it's fine to a point.

00:25:03.312 --> 00:25:09.432
But when your entire thing becomes just constant rumination, that's purposelessness.

00:25:09.432 --> 00:25:11.972
Because it doesn't go anywhere and it doesn't do anything.

00:25:11.972 --> 00:25:16.912
It's just, I'm going to read thing, think about thing, and then read next thing, listen to next thing.

00:25:16.912 --> 00:25:21.252
It's just a constant cycle of engagement in content.

00:25:21.252 --> 00:25:22.192
That's vacuous.

00:25:22.192 --> 00:25:23.452
There's nothing there.

00:25:23.452 --> 00:25:24.212
That's not a purpose.

00:25:24.212 --> 00:25:25.292
Don't do that.

00:25:25.292 --> 00:25:28.692
Find something else to do that's actually fulfilling.

00:25:28.692 --> 00:25:29.452
And that's thought.

00:25:29.452 --> 00:25:30.312
You would call that thought.

00:25:30.632 --> 00:25:31.372
You think about things.

00:25:31.372 --> 00:25:33.412
You're arguing with friends debating.

00:25:33.412 --> 00:25:36.772
You're thinking about this episode, thinking about whatever.

00:25:36.772 --> 00:25:44.092
The other aspect of thought, which is how it usually shows up in the Old Testament, specifically has to do with intent.

00:25:44.092 --> 00:25:50.692
So, you know, scripture talks about the thoughts of man being ever turned towards evil and various things like that.

00:25:50.692 --> 00:25:54.252
That is about intent, and that's distinct from rumination.

00:25:55.412 --> 00:26:06.692
When man is warned about his thoughts being inclined towards evil, that is not simply ruminating on bad things, but is desiring to do bad things.

00:26:06.692 --> 00:26:15.932
You know, if you have an encounter with a police officer, you know, you're face to face, you're not under arrest, but you've been detained and he's talking to you.

00:26:15.932 --> 00:26:17.512
Keep your hands at your side.

00:26:17.512 --> 00:26:18.672
Don't fidget.

00:26:18.672 --> 00:26:20.172
Don't reach for anything.

00:26:20.172 --> 00:26:21.392
Don't scratch yourself.

00:26:21.392 --> 00:26:22.572
Don't reach in your pockets.

00:26:23.072 --> 00:26:24.592
Don't grab your belt.

00:26:24.592 --> 00:26:26.552
Just leave your hands still.

00:26:26.552 --> 00:26:27.872
Why?

00:26:27.872 --> 00:26:30.272
Because I don't remember where I saw this.

00:26:30.272 --> 00:26:39.372
I saw like a week or two ago on X, somebody posted something in the effect that you can always tell a current or former cop because they're always watching your hands.

00:26:39.372 --> 00:26:42.672
And the reason for that is that hands betray intent.

00:26:42.672 --> 00:26:53.432
You know, for a police officer who's dealing with, in some cases, criminals, in many cases, suspects, monitoring what a man is doing with his hands is going to tell you what is going on in his head.

00:26:53.432 --> 00:26:55.632
Because those are subconscious tells.

00:26:55.632 --> 00:27:02.632
You know, if a man is concealing a weapon, he's going to subconsciously print, he's going to pat it, he's going to touch it.

00:27:02.632 --> 00:27:06.472
He wants to make sure it's still there while he's talking to a cop.

00:27:06.472 --> 00:27:07.892
And they don't even know that they're doing that.

00:27:07.892 --> 00:27:09.772
It's a subconscious process.

00:27:09.772 --> 00:27:19.392
What a well-trained cop is going to pick up on that and know this guy printed, this guy's definitely carrying a weapon, and he's thinking about, I'm talking to a cop, I got to make sure I have my weapon.

00:27:19.392 --> 00:27:20.692
That's probably criminal intent.

00:27:20.972 --> 00:27:24.332
There's something there that the cop now, he's not worried about what you're thinking about.

00:27:24.332 --> 00:27:27.592
He's worried about what does this guy intend to do.

00:27:27.592 --> 00:27:32.552
So the reason you just want to be calm and keep your hands at your side is so you're not distracting him.

00:27:32.552 --> 00:27:38.432
It's not that now you're going to trick him, but if you're being annoying and fidgety, it's just there's no point.

00:27:38.432 --> 00:27:45.512
You want a cop to be at ease, and if he's an ill-trained cop, if he's someone who picks up on that, but he's scared, you could be in danger in your life.

00:27:45.512 --> 00:27:48.572
Because if you're fidgeting and he thinks you have a gun and you don't, you're just itchy.

00:27:49.732 --> 00:27:53.272
You don't want to get shocked if somebody was poorly trained.

00:27:53.272 --> 00:27:59.072
That is the other kind of thought, the intent, the desire to do something.

00:27:59.072 --> 00:28:04.652
Because scripture is clear that our desire to do evil comes before the evil itself.

00:28:04.652 --> 00:28:21.052
If you have adulterous thoughts or murderous thoughts, those already are that sin in the heart, but they can then turn physically into the sin in the real world, where you have not simply thought evil as a desire, but then you follow through on it.

00:28:21.052 --> 00:28:27.932
Not everyone who thinks evil follows through on it, or the world would be a living hell, but even at that, it's still sin.

00:28:27.932 --> 00:28:38.472
But that sort of thought as intention is why it's important to think about this, because thought as intention is really what we're talking about when we say purpose.

00:28:38.472 --> 00:28:51.232
So again, to get back to that three-part continuum of duty, the universal purpose, the particular, and then the motivation, is the fire that stokes it.

00:28:53.932 --> 00:29:09.772
When you hear some concept that you decide applies to you, maybe you happen to be just for the sake of argument, because it's something common to all of us, you're listening to an episode of Stone Choir, and you hear something you never thought about before, and for some reason it just clicks.

00:29:09.832 --> 00:29:12.372
Like, oh man, that's me, that applies to me.

00:29:12.372 --> 00:29:18.812
That if it's a duty, it instantly becomes a purpose for you, because you like, yep, that's it.

00:29:18.812 --> 00:29:22.212
You don't need a long thought out process to adopt it.

00:29:22.212 --> 00:29:26.892
You're just like, yep, okay, I never thought about it, but absolutely that applies.

00:29:26.892 --> 00:29:29.352
Or maybe the opposite is true.

00:29:29.352 --> 00:29:32.312
Maybe you need to ruminate on it for a long time.

00:29:32.312 --> 00:29:41.592
And it's not that you had to, it's just you heard something that annoyed you, and it kind of stuck in the back of your teeth, and you had to pick at it until you eventually dealt with it.

00:29:41.592 --> 00:29:53.972
When rumination translates into actual purpose, when thought of rumination becomes thought of intention, that is the adoption of purpose that we're talking about.

00:29:53.972 --> 00:29:55.052
And it does necessarily happen.

00:29:55.052 --> 00:29:57.552
And like you said, it shouldn't happen most of the time.

00:29:57.552 --> 00:30:05.312
There are guys who I see online, it seems like every month, they have some new purpose, some new personality that they download.

00:30:05.312 --> 00:30:05.932
It's not everybody.

00:30:06.252 --> 00:30:12.032
It's typically younger guys that feel completely alienated from the world, and they just want to find something.

00:30:12.032 --> 00:30:14.412
And they're just trying on a bunch of different things.

00:30:14.412 --> 00:30:18.412
And so they cycle through seemingly personalities.

00:30:18.412 --> 00:30:26.012
They're mindlessly adopting a bunch of different purposes without, you know, they're thinking about it really hard, but they don't know what's going to stick.

00:30:26.012 --> 00:30:32.872
It's a tough place to be when you're a young guy, because we live in a world now where we lack almost any good examples for a lot of this stuff.

00:30:33.652 --> 00:30:47.172
As part of the problem, when you don't see examples of men who are well-motivated, who have also adopted good purposes that are attached to godly duties, that's a really hard place to be when you're a young guy just figuring out, what do I do?

00:30:47.172 --> 00:30:49.832
On the other hand, the world is full of terrible examples.

00:30:49.832 --> 00:30:52.852
You know, somebody like Andrew Tate is a prime example.

00:30:52.852 --> 00:30:54.372
He certainly has a purpose in life.

00:30:54.372 --> 00:30:57.832
He has several purposes, and they're basically all bad.

00:30:57.832 --> 00:31:00.012
They're abusing other people.

00:31:00.012 --> 00:31:01.732
They're accumulating wealth to no end.

00:31:02.232 --> 00:31:02.852
They're lying.

00:31:02.852 --> 00:31:03.412
They're grifting.

00:31:03.412 --> 00:31:05.612
It's just gross, but he's driven.

00:31:05.612 --> 00:31:15.012
He's motivated, and so guys who don't evaluate that sort of scene in a moral framework are like, well, look how motivated this guy is.

00:31:15.012 --> 00:31:17.612
He's got a Bugatti, and never mind, he's renting it.

00:31:17.612 --> 00:31:32.292
But when you see what seems to be purpose, and you see what seems to be motivation, and it all seems to be clicking, if you're missing the part that that's actually all really terrible, it can seem appealing, because you just focus on whatever good part is spent.

00:31:32.292 --> 00:31:34.432
Like having more money is nice.

00:31:34.432 --> 00:31:36.472
Having girls like you is nice.

00:31:36.472 --> 00:31:39.292
Doing it the way he's doing it is disgusting.

00:31:39.292 --> 00:31:47.432
But when a young guy has no money and has not one girl, the prospect of accumulating a whole bunch seems appealing.

00:31:47.432 --> 00:31:55.232
And so there's a draw to listen to those guys, and then adopt whatever purpose they're selling, even though they're frauds, they're liars.

00:31:55.232 --> 00:32:00.612
But it's an easy trap to fall into, because it seems like it's working.

00:32:00.612 --> 00:32:05.792
You need some positive rumination to say, okay, I'm going to think about this before I make it my purpose.

00:32:05.792 --> 00:32:10.832
You know, evaluate carefully whatever it is, and be ready to walk away from anything.

00:32:10.832 --> 00:32:16.032
You don't need to adopt some new idea that you got on the internet, including and especially from us.

00:32:16.032 --> 00:32:18.032
Think about it, it seems like rubbish.

00:32:18.032 --> 00:32:20.072
Set it aside and go do something else.

00:32:20.072 --> 00:32:21.132
That's good.

00:32:21.272 --> 00:32:31.812
You're far better off making mistakes about filtering out things that might have been good if it means you're filtering out a ton of crap than if you adopt everything that floats by.

00:32:31.812 --> 00:32:36.092
Because if you keep adopting everything you hear about, you're just going to be a hamster in a wheel.

00:32:36.092 --> 00:32:40.792
You're going to make a mess of your life more so than if you're overly cautious.

00:32:40.792 --> 00:32:53.652
You know, the hard part of wisdom and maturity is finding the balance, finding out how to think and be cautious and be ruminative, and then strike when you do finally find a purpose that's worth adopting.

00:32:53.652 --> 00:32:55.712
You find a duty like, yeah, I want this to be mine.

00:32:55.712 --> 00:32:58.092
I want to make it particular to my life.

00:32:59.392 --> 00:33:03.292
So as I mentioned, you're going to have a number of purposes in life.

00:33:03.292 --> 00:33:06.972
And as well mentioned, those may change over time.

00:33:06.972 --> 00:33:12.532
You may not have the same purposes today that you have 10 years from now.

00:33:12.532 --> 00:33:19.112
You may not have the same purposes that you had 10 years earlier, depending on how old you happen to be right now.

00:33:20.212 --> 00:33:23.972
Duty by and large does not change through your life.

00:33:24.272 --> 00:33:38.432
You can acquire additional duties, and some of those duties are temporal, but duty changes seldom, and you don't really pick up new ones and gain them and choose to drop them.

00:33:38.432 --> 00:33:39.612
They are part of life.

00:33:39.612 --> 00:33:42.852
They're part of how God has created things.

00:33:44.132 --> 00:33:48.092
And there is that connection between duty and purpose.

00:33:48.092 --> 00:33:54.132
And so you don't want your purpose in life, your purpose is, plural, in life, to change frequently.

00:33:55.272 --> 00:34:03.172
These are things about which you should think, at which you should take on, in a very serious fashion, not lightly.

00:34:03.172 --> 00:34:13.012
Not all purposes have to be heavy and serious in something that is vitally important to your life, because you could have a purpose that is transitory.

00:34:13.012 --> 00:34:16.352
You could, for instance, have a purpose that drives you.

00:34:16.352 --> 00:34:17.952
You want to visit every national park.

00:34:18.992 --> 00:34:23.672
You want to visit every major peak in the lower 48.

00:34:23.672 --> 00:34:25.032
Probably don't want to include Alaska.

00:34:25.032 --> 00:34:26.472
That's a lot harder.

00:34:27.512 --> 00:34:30.572
And that could be one of your purposes in life.

00:34:30.572 --> 00:34:32.112
And that can drive you.

00:34:32.112 --> 00:34:35.512
You can have a motivation to get that done.

00:34:35.512 --> 00:34:47.552
As Will was saying with regard to attracting women, for the young men out there in the audience, having some kind of purpose like that is going to make you seem more attractive to women.

00:34:48.652 --> 00:35:00.532
Because it makes it seem like, because it is an indication that you are not listless, not just wandering through life with no purpose, with no point.

00:35:02.252 --> 00:35:04.252
This can be achieved in a number of different ways.

00:35:04.252 --> 00:35:06.332
That could be, that's essentially a hobby.

00:35:06.332 --> 00:35:09.492
So you can pick up other hobbies.

00:35:09.492 --> 00:35:11.772
Hobbies can be a purpose in life.

00:35:11.772 --> 00:35:16.492
They can't be your sole purpose in life, and they certainly shouldn't be your core purpose in life.

00:35:17.212 --> 00:35:20.152
But they can be part of your purpose in life.

00:35:20.152 --> 00:35:37.692
And particularly, if you do not yet have a wife and children, that's the sort of thing that can drive you to make you into the sort of man who is ready to have a wife and children, who is ready to take on those duties, to have that purpose.

00:35:37.692 --> 00:35:51.752
As we said, we can't really necessarily give you a recommendation for which purposes you adopt, which ones you make your own, and then use those to drive you forward in life.

00:35:51.752 --> 00:36:00.412
But there is sort of one general recommendation that of course we can give to all the men in the audience, and this applies to women as well.

00:36:00.412 --> 00:36:02.312
Stay physically fit.

00:36:02.312 --> 00:36:14.532
That is something that you can take on as one of your purposes in life, and it can actually help you with motivation too, because if you are physically fit, in some ways it's easier to keep your motivation high.

00:36:15.332 --> 00:36:18.092
Part of this is just biological reality.

00:36:18.092 --> 00:36:34.652
Not all of what we are discussing today is purely mental, because yes, you have to have that mental fortitude, you have to have the will and the desire to do these things, but some of them require you to be in good health, to be physically fit.

00:36:34.652 --> 00:36:46.272
For instance, if you wanted to take up visiting all of the national parks as a purpose in life, if you are going to do any hiking or anything while you are there, you have to be physically fit.

00:36:46.272 --> 00:36:51.372
And so another purpose in life could be to stay in good shape.

00:36:51.372 --> 00:36:57.672
And that is something that we should, as Christians, seek to do because we should take care of the bodies that God has given us.

00:36:58.952 --> 00:37:10.072
So if you are a man, find a group of men, perhaps in your church, locally, wherever it happens to be, and go to the gym, lift weights, stay in good shape.

00:37:10.072 --> 00:37:11.812
That can be part of your purpose in life.

00:37:11.872 --> 00:37:15.512
That is one that should remain throughout your entire life.

00:37:15.512 --> 00:37:21.292
You're obviously going to do more of it when you're in your 20s, 30s, and 40s than when you're 70 or 80, of course.

00:37:21.292 --> 00:37:25.632
But that is something that should stick with you.

00:37:25.632 --> 00:37:30.192
And then to that, you can add hobbies and other things.

00:37:30.192 --> 00:37:36.712
These help to drive you forward and build you up into the sort of man that is ready to have a wife and children.

00:37:36.712 --> 00:37:49.132
And I keep returning to that one because of course, historically and properly, just by the design of things, God's intention, that is going to be the core purpose in life for most men.

00:37:49.132 --> 00:37:53.252
Not for all men, certainly, but for most men.

00:37:53.252 --> 00:38:02.852
Some men will have very important purposes other than family, sometimes in addition to family, sometimes to the exclusion of family.

00:38:02.852 --> 00:38:10.772
But for most men, throughout all of history, and still today, family is going to be that core purpose.

00:38:10.832 --> 00:38:17.172
It's one of the reasons that we're so concerned with that topic, and we address it in a number of different episodes.

00:38:18.532 --> 00:38:30.892
And every time the topic comes up, I think back to the Genesis narrative, the Garden of Eden, because Adam, who walked with God, God still said of him, it is not good for man to be alone.

00:38:30.892 --> 00:38:33.932
That's how important that is to God.

00:38:33.932 --> 00:38:36.932
That's how important it is to the system he designed.

00:38:37.612 --> 00:38:42.672
It is so central to what he intends for men and women.

00:38:42.672 --> 00:38:56.912
And so we are always going to be strong advocates for marriage and child rearing, and it is something on which our society and certainly our churches should focus, and they are failing to do that, but we've covered that in other topics.

00:38:59.112 --> 00:39:14.512
But for individual men, for those who are seeking to have a wife and children, to have a family, as a core purpose in their life, part of how you do that is having other purposes as well.

00:39:14.512 --> 00:39:19.252
A wife and children cannot be your sole purpose, or you will never have them.

00:39:19.252 --> 00:39:23.572
And if you do have them, you will not be doing it as well as you could.

00:39:23.572 --> 00:39:26.412
You have to have other purposes in life as well.

00:39:26.412 --> 00:39:39.192
You can think of it sort of as a collection of buckets that you're investing time or sand or however you want to conceive of it, because what you're investing is actually time into these buckets.

00:39:39.192 --> 00:39:44.992
And so filling them basically is your purpose, just an illustration to think about this.

00:39:44.992 --> 00:39:51.052
You have a finite amount of time, of course, and how you invest it is your purpose.

00:39:51.052 --> 00:39:55.772
You're investing it into either good things or bad things.

00:39:55.772 --> 00:39:57.152
You want to have that motivation.

00:39:57.152 --> 00:40:02.452
You want to keep that fire burning so that you invest that time into good things.

00:40:03.412 --> 00:40:11.512
And I'm not using invest in sort of the market sense of the term, because you're not necessarily looking for a return on all of these things.

00:40:11.512 --> 00:40:16.312
Some of it is just spending your time, and there's nothing wrong with that.

00:40:16.312 --> 00:40:23.572
It may be that you spend some of your time by sitting at the coffee shop or sitting at the bar with friends.

00:40:23.572 --> 00:40:24.212
That's fine.

00:40:24.212 --> 00:40:31.152
That's still part of this life, and that can be part of your purpose as well, because you're investing that time.

00:40:31.212 --> 00:40:36.692
You've made part of your purpose, maintaining those relationships with friends.

00:40:36.692 --> 00:40:38.132
It's important to have that.

00:40:38.132 --> 00:40:40.112
It's vital to have that.

00:40:40.112 --> 00:40:51.312
You are going to be more likely to find a wife and to be prepared to keep a wife and a family if you have those other relationships as well.

00:40:51.312 --> 00:40:57.572
If you allow yourself to become isolated, you are going to be worse off.

00:40:57.572 --> 00:40:59.352
So you need to have these other purposes.

00:40:59.412 --> 00:41:02.632
You need to have other things that you do in life.

00:41:02.632 --> 00:41:12.952
We see too many young men these days who decide rightly that they want a wife and children, and then focus on that to the exclusion of everything else.

00:41:12.952 --> 00:41:16.052
They're going about it almost exactly backwards.

00:41:16.052 --> 00:41:22.072
You have to focus on the other things because that is what prepares you to have a wife and children.

00:41:22.072 --> 00:41:26.252
That is what makes you the sort of man who will attract a wife.

00:41:26.252 --> 00:41:27.612
And that's an important part of this.

00:41:28.232 --> 00:41:38.572
Yes, ideally, we would have systems in place where family and friends and church and things like that help to set up couples, and we should certainly work on that.

00:41:38.572 --> 00:41:47.512
But you still have to be the sort of person when they introduce you to, this is my niece, or this is my granddaughter, whatever it happens to be.

00:41:47.512 --> 00:41:53.752
When they introduce you, you have to be the sort of man who isn't repulsive to women.

00:41:53.752 --> 00:42:04.172
You have to be the sort of man who is ready to step into that role of husband and father, as ready as a man can be, of course, because no man is ever entirely ready for that.

00:42:04.172 --> 00:42:08.812
This is one of those things that you sort of learn as you go, much like riding a bike.

00:42:08.812 --> 00:42:16.712
But having these other purposes in life is vitally important, and is something that particularly young men should work on.

00:42:16.712 --> 00:42:21.332
You need to have a personality, you need to be your own man.

00:42:21.332 --> 00:42:33.692
And so you find these purposes that are compatible, and you spend your time on those, you invest your time in those, and then from there you can mature into the other purposes in life.

00:42:34.732 --> 00:42:42.832
You can't just have this fixation, this monomania with regard to a wife and children.

00:42:42.832 --> 00:42:44.892
I'm not saying it's bad.

00:42:44.892 --> 00:42:47.892
I would hope that that's very clear by now.

00:42:47.892 --> 00:42:58.332
But focusing on that to the exclusion of other things will actually preclude you from achieving that central goal, from having that core purpose in life.

00:42:58.332 --> 00:43:02.012
It almost seems like it's counterintuitive, and perhaps it is.

00:43:02.012 --> 00:43:04.592
But that's just the way these things work.

00:43:04.592 --> 00:43:06.932
You need to have those other purposes.

00:43:06.932 --> 00:43:13.832
You need to build up who you are as a man, so that you can then have these other things.

00:43:13.832 --> 00:43:17.612
And trust in God that he will give you those things.

00:43:17.612 --> 00:43:22.492
It doesn't mean that every man will necessarily find a wife and have children.

00:43:22.552 --> 00:43:28.632
We're certainly dealing with imperfect conditions in this day and age.

00:43:28.632 --> 00:43:46.252
But if we can help each other, if we can help build up our brothers, so that they have this set of purposes in life, and they have the motivation to follow through with it, they will be the sort of men who are more likely to have the family that they want to have.

00:43:47.332 --> 00:43:54.812
Because this is not just a matter of, again, finding that wife and having children.

00:43:54.812 --> 00:43:56.252
It's not a matter of that.

00:43:56.252 --> 00:44:01.512
It's a matter of becoming the totality of what you're supposed to be as a man.

00:44:01.512 --> 00:44:03.812
Well-rounded is a term that is often used.

00:44:03.812 --> 00:44:10.332
It is an accurate term, because you need to have a variety of purposes in life.

00:44:10.332 --> 00:44:18.252
This will also help you with motivation, because different purposes will be driven by different sets of motivations.

00:44:18.252 --> 00:44:33.232
And so you won't necessarily burn yourself out with regard to one motivation, because you have all of these smaller fires burning, and you can keep them all burning more easily than if you just have this one big bonfire that might burn out.

00:44:33.232 --> 00:44:37.652
You don't want that one sole motivation, because then you're at risk.

00:44:37.652 --> 00:44:39.692
You have that sort of one point of failure.

00:44:41.252 --> 00:44:50.852
Whereas, you do not have that, if you have a collection of purposes, with, again, probably overlapping, but different sets of motivations.

00:44:54.092 --> 00:45:01.932
As I said earlier, motivation is frequently, at least partially, if not largely emotional.

00:45:01.932 --> 00:45:05.072
It's not necessarily going to be an intellectual process.

00:45:05.072 --> 00:45:13.472
I think I've mentioned before on Stone Choir, so I won't go into much detail, but 12 years ago or so I decided I wanted to lose weight.

00:45:13.472 --> 00:45:14.512
I saw a picture of my face.

00:45:14.512 --> 00:45:19.452
I had a fat face, getting fatter, and it made me angry.

00:45:19.452 --> 00:45:20.712
And it wasn't self-loathing.

00:45:20.712 --> 00:45:23.812
I looked at that and like, that's not me.

00:45:23.812 --> 00:45:34.572
And that anger, seeing someone who was a messed up version of who I knew I really was, was my motivation to lose weight.

00:45:34.572 --> 00:45:42.932
And so I went through the intellectual process of, learning about diet and exercise and a bunch of stuff, very nerdy approach to everything.

00:45:42.932 --> 00:45:53.532
When I say mad and angry, I don't mean like actual breaking walls or anything, just indignation, that this is crap and I'm not going to put up with it.

00:45:53.532 --> 00:45:55.472
And so for me, that was my motivation.

00:45:55.472 --> 00:45:56.332
I wasn't fat.

00:45:56.332 --> 00:45:57.692
I was just, that was disappointing.

00:45:57.692 --> 00:45:59.012
I was flabby.

00:45:59.012 --> 00:46:02.192
I wasn't who I wanted to be, but most people wouldn't have called me fat.

00:46:02.192 --> 00:46:03.472
I wish somebody had.

00:46:03.472 --> 00:46:07.492
I wish a friend had said, dude, you're looking kind of fat, because it would have made me angry.

00:46:07.492 --> 00:46:08.812
And I always said, really?

00:46:08.812 --> 00:46:09.412
I'll show you.

00:46:09.412 --> 00:46:11.772
And I would have done something about it.

00:46:11.772 --> 00:46:16.112
I had to figure it out for myself, but my motivation was not rational.

00:46:16.112 --> 00:46:18.612
It wasn't, oh, here are the health benefits or anything else.

00:46:18.612 --> 00:46:20.712
It was just, I'm ticked off.

00:46:20.712 --> 00:46:21.592
I don't like it.

00:46:21.592 --> 00:46:24.052
And I'm going to keep doing this until I fix it.

00:46:24.052 --> 00:46:26.032
And so I changed my diet.

00:46:26.032 --> 00:46:36.652
I didn't change it a lot because I knew that for my personal style, that I wasn't going to be motivated to eat completely clean and eliminate all the things that I enjoyed.

00:46:36.652 --> 00:46:39.112
I didn't, I like switched to keto or anything.

00:46:39.112 --> 00:46:42.272
I tried that once for like a day and lost my mind.

00:46:42.272 --> 00:46:44.432
I'll die if I go without carbs.

00:46:44.432 --> 00:46:45.192
That's bad.

00:46:45.192 --> 00:46:48.472
You want to see me actually angry, that keto will do it.

00:46:48.472 --> 00:46:52.532
What I did was just got rid of some of the stuff and I started paying attention to what I was eating.

00:46:52.532 --> 00:46:54.372
I reduced my intake.

00:46:54.372 --> 00:46:58.632
So I didn't change it a lot, but I changed it consistently.

00:46:58.632 --> 00:47:01.952
Every time I went to the store, there were entire aisles I avoided entirely.

00:47:03.052 --> 00:47:04.652
And that was just the stop.

00:47:04.652 --> 00:47:12.332
If I go down this aisle, I may pick up crap that's going to make me get into a munchy mode and I'm going to lose the ground that I've gained.

00:47:12.332 --> 00:47:17.932
And so for me personally, that was my motivation process.

00:47:17.932 --> 00:47:22.692
Wasn't a lot of thought, wasn't a lot of rumination and strategizing.

00:47:22.692 --> 00:47:24.332
It was just, no, don't do that.

00:47:24.332 --> 00:47:27.532
I was just yelling at myself, you're not allowed to do that.

00:47:27.532 --> 00:47:31.152
And for me, that personally is the motivation that works for me.

00:47:32.032 --> 00:47:37.552
You know, one of the examples, when you're thinking about fitness would be a personal trainer.

00:47:37.552 --> 00:47:44.772
So you go hire a personal trainer, you spend a lot of money, and they will show you the proper form of exercises, and they'll watch you and they'll motivate you.

00:47:44.772 --> 00:47:46.612
Typically, they're going to be very encouraging.

00:47:46.612 --> 00:47:52.492
You know, they're good at the sports psychology aspect of, here's what is going to motivate different people.

00:47:52.492 --> 00:47:54.232
That works very well for some people.

00:47:54.232 --> 00:47:58.112
That's something encouraging, saying, you know, dig deep, five more, blah, blah, blah.

00:47:58.112 --> 00:47:59.132
That would drive me insane.

00:47:59.592 --> 00:48:01.252
I don't want anyone looking at me.

00:48:01.252 --> 00:48:02.932
I don't want any critiques.

00:48:02.932 --> 00:48:04.412
Just leave me alone.

00:48:04.412 --> 00:48:05.732
I know what I need to do.

00:48:05.732 --> 00:48:06.812
And so that's personal.

00:48:06.812 --> 00:48:09.312
Other people, what I did wouldn't work for them.

00:48:09.312 --> 00:48:14.852
And so there's not a lot to say about motivation, except that it's going to be extremely personal.

00:48:14.872 --> 00:48:16.472
It's not that you're going to be unique.

00:48:16.472 --> 00:48:23.332
You know, once you get past, like, the top six styles of personal motivation, you probably exhausted almost all of them.

00:48:23.332 --> 00:48:25.232
Some people need encouragement.

00:48:25.232 --> 00:48:26.572
Some people need optimism.

00:48:26.572 --> 00:48:27.992
Some people need to get fired up.

00:48:28.352 --> 00:48:29.232
I'm just mad.

00:48:29.232 --> 00:48:30.072
I was ticked.

00:48:30.072 --> 00:48:31.592
I was always ticked.

00:48:31.592 --> 00:48:35.132
I'm not very angry again, but just like, no, absolutely not.

00:48:35.132 --> 00:48:37.432
I'm not going to look in the mirror and see a fat man.

00:48:37.432 --> 00:48:42.732
And so being mad in that way was my personal motivation.

00:48:42.732 --> 00:48:43.792
That works for other things too.

00:48:43.792 --> 00:48:47.352
I've, you know, started Stone Choir because I was mad.

00:48:47.352 --> 00:48:50.252
It's not that this is an anger-filled podcast.

00:48:50.252 --> 00:49:00.212
It's just I was sick and tired of seeing guys who should have known better failing to say the things they should have done and messing up things that were easy, should have been easy.

00:49:00.212 --> 00:49:04.032
So we started this out of anger and frustration.

00:49:04.032 --> 00:49:05.892
But it's not that we're angry and frustrated.

00:49:05.892 --> 00:49:08.692
It's just really no one else is going to show up and do this.

00:49:08.692 --> 00:49:10.932
This is so obvious.

00:49:10.932 --> 00:49:12.452
So we showed up and did it.

00:49:12.452 --> 00:49:15.032
And people keep making those same mistakes.

00:49:15.032 --> 00:49:17.692
So I guess that motivation is kind of internal in this case.

00:49:17.692 --> 00:49:20.232
But like, for me, that is my style.

00:49:20.232 --> 00:49:21.372
You may have a different style.

00:49:21.372 --> 00:49:24.012
Some of you will hear that and say, yep, that's exactly what I'm like.

00:49:24.372 --> 00:49:25.892
I know exactly what he means.

00:49:25.892 --> 00:49:29.112
Others, probably the majority of the people listening think, that sounds awful.

00:49:29.112 --> 00:49:30.712
What's wrong with that guy?

00:49:30.712 --> 00:49:34.092
It's a certain personal impetus.

00:49:34.092 --> 00:49:40.312
It's something that's going to be unique to an individual, or particularly to an individual, but not unique.

00:49:40.312 --> 00:49:42.912
And so I can't tell you what's going to motivate you.

00:49:42.912 --> 00:49:47.352
And as Corey said, you're going to have different types of motivations for different things.

00:49:47.352 --> 00:49:47.812
That's fine.

00:49:47.812 --> 00:49:48.552
That's normal.

00:49:48.552 --> 00:49:50.792
It's a good, balanced, well-rounded life.

00:49:51.552 --> 00:49:59.512
But the purpose of pointing out that you will have some motivation, if you don't know what your motivation is, you've never given it any thought.

00:49:59.512 --> 00:50:07.612
If you don't pay a little bit of attention to your motivation, and make sure that you don't let it wane, you don't want that fire to go out, whatever the fire is.

00:50:07.612 --> 00:50:09.412
Maybe your fire is optimism.

00:50:09.412 --> 00:50:11.292
You just want to be really happy.

00:50:11.292 --> 00:50:17.612
And whatever optimist, I'm not going to describe that because I'm so the opposite, but I'm sure it works for some people.

00:50:17.612 --> 00:50:18.792
And great if it does.

00:50:18.792 --> 00:50:19.792
You're not doing it wrong.

00:50:20.392 --> 00:50:23.132
You're just doing it in a way that would absolutely kill me.

00:50:23.132 --> 00:50:25.412
It wouldn't work at all.

00:50:25.412 --> 00:50:32.232
That's why you can't give particular advice about motivation because it's going to be individualized.

00:50:32.232 --> 00:50:44.852
You know, one of the other things that can become a cycle of despair and frustration is maybe you do adopt the purpose of I want to lose weight or I'm going to improve whatever.

00:50:44.852 --> 00:50:46.852
Or maybe you just become depressed.

00:50:46.852 --> 00:50:48.872
You're actually suffering from legit depression.

00:50:49.512 --> 00:50:53.692
And whatever your purposes are in life, you have the intellectual engagement.

00:50:53.692 --> 00:50:55.592
Okay, this is the stuff I need to do.

00:50:55.592 --> 00:51:06.812
But you wake up in the morning and you can't imagine anything worse than actually getting out of that bed because you know that as bad as it was when you went to sleep, it's going to be even worse when you get out of bed.

00:51:06.812 --> 00:51:13.192
That's irrational and you know it's irrational, but it's an easy thing to wallow in.

00:51:13.192 --> 00:51:23.312
And depression fuels itself with that sort of wallowing, with that sort of avoidant behavior, where the motivation battery, it just drained to zero.

00:51:23.312 --> 00:51:24.872
It's not like there's a little bit of juice left.

00:51:24.872 --> 00:51:26.632
There's nothing left.

00:51:26.632 --> 00:51:30.332
And that's a really deadly trap for someone to fall into.

00:51:30.332 --> 00:51:34.952
You know, when someone, you get really genuinely obese, which again, I was.

00:51:34.952 --> 00:51:36.432
I didn't have some struggle with weight.

00:51:36.432 --> 00:51:37.732
I just, I didn't look good.

00:51:37.752 --> 00:51:38.492
Like, this is dumb.

00:51:38.492 --> 00:51:39.932
I should do better.

00:51:39.932 --> 00:51:45.192
Some people legitimately have real health problems, and that's a much bigger struggle.

00:51:45.312 --> 00:51:48.612
That's a life-changing, life-defining problem.

00:51:48.612 --> 00:51:51.632
It's far bigger than anything that I personally understand.

00:51:51.632 --> 00:52:05.032
It's typical to have zero motivation, because despite having the intellectual engagement, and I have a purpose of not being like this, you don't even know where to begin, and you give up before you even start moving.

00:52:05.032 --> 00:52:13.392
And so one of the aspects of motivation, as it intersects with purpose and duty, is that there's a vector there.

00:52:13.892 --> 00:52:15.292
You have to have momentum.

00:52:15.292 --> 00:52:21.292
It's not sufficient to be pointed in a direction, but you have to actually be moving.

00:52:21.292 --> 00:52:23.892
And your motivation is the fuel.

00:52:23.892 --> 00:52:25.692
It's what keeps you moving.

00:52:25.692 --> 00:52:29.052
And it's going to be individualized to you what does that.

00:52:29.052 --> 00:52:35.012
But when you run out of that, if you don't have that, maybe someone has to come along and help you, pick you up, support you.

00:52:35.012 --> 00:52:36.552
Maybe they need to kick your butt.

00:52:36.552 --> 00:52:44.032
Like Corey's describing earlier, the really fat guy, the chef, who he was like 450 pounds or something, he was super fat.

00:52:44.032 --> 00:52:48.432
And his friend abused him every day for months and months, and he'd lost weight.

00:52:48.432 --> 00:52:50.612
That wouldn't work for everyone, but it worked for him.

00:52:50.612 --> 00:52:53.552
And because they were friends, and they knew each other, you knew it would work.

00:52:53.552 --> 00:52:56.932
If you do that to a stranger on the internet, it's probably not going to be motivating.

00:52:56.932 --> 00:52:58.752
It's probably going to be awful.

00:52:58.752 --> 00:53:04.092
It's not that that sort of thing that would be abuse in one circumstance can mean motivation in another.

00:53:04.092 --> 00:53:07.292
That's what we mean when we say it's personal, it's particularized.

00:53:07.292 --> 00:53:16.512
You need to be aware that if you've gotten off into a rut, if things have gotten really bad, you need to figure something out and figure out where to find your motivation.

00:53:16.512 --> 00:53:18.172
Because it's not that you're purposeless.

00:53:18.172 --> 00:53:20.472
It's not that you don't know what you need to do.

00:53:20.472 --> 00:53:22.172
It's you can't start moving.

00:53:22.172 --> 00:53:27.312
Your inertia is immobilized, and what you need is momentum.

00:53:27.312 --> 00:53:28.572
You need to move.

00:53:28.572 --> 00:53:31.132
You need a direction of motion.

00:53:31.132 --> 00:53:38.212
Even just a little bit, like the hardest part to getting a vehicle moving is to go from a dead stop to beginning to move.

00:53:38.592 --> 00:53:41.792
That breaking loose takes more energy than keeping going.

00:53:41.792 --> 00:53:43.632
It doesn't take much energy to keep a car moving.

00:53:43.632 --> 00:53:46.632
It takes a lot more energy to get it up to speed.

00:53:46.632 --> 00:53:49.872
People are the same way, even psychologically, even emotionally.

00:53:49.872 --> 00:54:02.972
Like these things where it's not that you think about it, but if you neglect thinking about the fact that if you're absent any motivation, you know what you need to do and you just have no desire to do it, and it's just, you're drained.

00:54:02.972 --> 00:54:04.152
I don't know how to help you with that.

00:54:04.152 --> 00:54:08.872
Like that's a genuine problem, but that's the problem needs to be solved.

00:54:08.872 --> 00:54:17.772
The problem of any lack of motivation, and so the distinguishing motivation from purpose, that's where the rubber meets the road there.

00:54:17.772 --> 00:54:19.472
You can have all the good ideas in the world.

00:54:19.472 --> 00:54:39.452
You can have all the book knowledge and all the right answers for the test, but if you aren't showing up and doing it every day, you know, if you want to lose weight, but every time you go grocery shopping, you buy the same crap that you're going to snack on and pig out on and lose all the gains that you had during the week, well, you're doing something wrong.

00:54:39.452 --> 00:54:41.752
You have to change that habit.

00:54:41.752 --> 00:54:47.292
And I think that's the other aspect of motivation is that part of it's just habit forming, part of it's training.

00:54:47.292 --> 00:54:54.232
By the time someone gets to be in the Major League, they probably swung a bat close to 50,000 times.

00:54:54.232 --> 00:55:00.232
So when a batter steps up to the plate, his purpose is to hit the ball, but he's not thinking about hitting the ball.

00:55:00.232 --> 00:55:12.912
You know, he might be thinking about the pitcher and how his arm is doing and what pitches he's good at and what pitches the particular batter wants to see because he knows he's good at hitting them, but he's not thinking about how to swing the bat.

00:55:12.912 --> 00:55:14.312
That's muscle memory.

00:55:14.312 --> 00:55:15.372
There's no thought there.

00:55:15.372 --> 00:55:24.192
There's a purpose there, but the motivation went into having swung the bat 50,000 times to get into the Major Leagues in the first place.

00:55:24.192 --> 00:55:30.592
So motivation and training and habit forming are all kind of along the same spectrum.

00:55:31.212 --> 00:55:42.652
It's something that the showing up and the doing, the hard part, the actual work, is going to be completely distinct for any particular purpose, which is why there's no general advice beyond you need to find it.

00:55:42.892 --> 00:55:49.712
You need to figure out what your motivation needs to be to achieve a purpose, and then make sure that you stoke it.

00:55:49.712 --> 00:55:51.232
As Corey said, attend it as well.

00:55:52.112 --> 00:55:53.612
Don't burn yourself out.

00:55:53.612 --> 00:55:54.612
You know, it's entirely...

00:55:54.792 --> 00:56:05.872
I saw a mutual yesterday, he was probably sick because he was in bed all day, and he was talking about his process and work ethic, making him feel terrible, making him feel lazy for having stayed in bed.

00:56:05.872 --> 00:56:08.732
That wasn't a failure of motivation if you're sick.

00:56:08.732 --> 00:56:16.312
The best thing that you can do if you're run down and you can't move, if at all possible, is to stay in bed, give your body the rest that it needs.

00:56:16.312 --> 00:56:20.952
That's not laziness, that's not an absence of motivation.

00:56:20.952 --> 00:56:23.572
To be motivated doesn't mean to be moving all the time.

00:56:23.992 --> 00:56:27.752
That sort of frenetic, I don't even know how to describe it.

00:56:27.752 --> 00:56:32.832
There's something about kind of the boomer ethos to just say, I gotta do all the time.

00:56:32.832 --> 00:56:33.792
And they're not alike.

00:56:33.792 --> 00:56:39.072
That's not a sin of the boomer in particular, but it seems like there's more of them than others.

00:56:39.072 --> 00:56:40.492
It's okay to take a break.

00:56:40.492 --> 00:56:41.972
You actually need to do it.

00:56:41.972 --> 00:56:43.912
Our bodies need it, our minds need it.

00:56:43.912 --> 00:56:45.992
And it's not a lack of motivation to do it.

00:56:45.992 --> 00:56:52.052
So to say that you should be motivated is not to say the same as, you can never stop moving.

00:56:53.132 --> 00:57:05.552
Motivation is a meme that's been floating around for years where there's a guy standing in front of a big barbell and the fog bubble says, if I don't lift this, I'm gay and my entire family will die.

00:57:05.552 --> 00:57:06.992
That's motivation.

00:57:06.992 --> 00:57:13.632
It's not necessarily rational, even though there might be bits and pieces of reason at the far end of those statements.

00:57:13.672 --> 00:57:18.712
But it's just the motivation is, I gotta do this, I gotta do this, I gotta do one more.

00:57:18.712 --> 00:57:28.352
And again, that like sports psychology is all about digging deep and pushing yourself, and you need to find that somehow, or have someone help you find it.

00:57:28.352 --> 00:57:31.872
But identify it and then just make sure you stoke it.

00:57:31.872 --> 00:57:36.292
There's not much to say beyond that, because I don't know what your personal purposes are gonna be.

00:57:36.292 --> 00:57:39.692
But if you don't have motivation, I can guarantee your purpose will fail.

00:57:39.692 --> 00:57:40.852
You will not do your duty.

00:57:41.372 --> 00:57:45.692
You will not live up to the purpose you've adopted if you have no motivation.

00:57:45.692 --> 00:57:56.012
And so the reason it's worth thinking about briefly is to find it, identify it, stoke it and fuel it and care for it, and make sure that you're on the right track.

00:57:56.012 --> 00:58:05.632
If something seemed like it was a good motivation for a while and it stopped working, change it up, find some other motivation, do something else to achieve the purpose.

00:58:05.632 --> 00:58:08.152
And so that feedback loop is a part of it.

00:58:08.732 --> 00:58:12.852
And again, all this is not to say that you need to be thinking all the time.

00:58:12.852 --> 00:58:16.112
That's the trap that we're trying to exhort you to get away from.

00:58:16.112 --> 00:58:16.972
Don't think all the time.

00:58:16.972 --> 00:58:30.112
Think periodically, like, okay, check in, measure what I'm doing, what I'm trying to do, how I'm approaching things against success, and against, you know, in the case of duty and godly duty, is it good, should I be doing this stuff?

00:58:30.112 --> 00:58:31.772
Hopefully that happened first.

00:58:31.772 --> 00:58:37.312
But if you're, you know, you're midway through your life, maybe you've adopted purposes that turn out, maybe you shouldn't have been doing them.

00:58:37.832 --> 00:58:39.452
Check in, fix it.

00:58:39.452 --> 00:58:40.612
That's it.

00:58:40.612 --> 00:58:41.812
And then move on.

00:58:41.812 --> 00:58:43.172
You adopt a new purpose.

00:58:43.172 --> 00:58:44.252
You find a new motivation.

00:58:44.252 --> 00:58:45.372
You just keep going.

00:58:45.372 --> 00:58:46.412
That's life.

00:58:46.412 --> 00:58:49.432
There's not a ton of thinking and arguing and debating.

00:58:49.432 --> 00:58:51.472
It's deciding and then acting.

00:58:53.652 --> 00:59:13.012
If you talk to people who have hiked any of the three Triple Crown Trails, the long-distance trails that run north to south, basically dividing the continent, the US., in half, because you have the Continental, the Pacific Crest, and the Appalachian.

00:59:13.012 --> 00:59:20.152
If you talk to those who have hiked those trails, they will often tell you, you can do some preparation for the trail.

00:59:20.152 --> 00:59:23.592
Obviously, of course, because you can get into decent cardio shape.

00:59:23.592 --> 00:59:27.632
I know some in the audience hate cardio, but you really should.

00:59:27.632 --> 00:59:30.032
You can get accustomed to your gear.

00:59:30.032 --> 00:59:34.412
You can get accustomed to the food you eat on the trail to some degree.

00:59:34.412 --> 00:59:45.232
But by and large, they will all say, you don't really get used to it until you've been hiking for some number of weeks, or at least some number of days.

00:59:45.232 --> 00:59:47.512
Usually it's weeks.

00:59:47.512 --> 00:59:52.212
Your body just becomes accustomed to the trail, and it gets easier.

00:59:52.212 --> 00:59:53.532
It gets to be more enjoyable.

00:59:55.012 --> 00:59:59.972
So it starts out as you have that desire, in this case, that's your motivation.

00:59:59.972 --> 01:00:03.352
Your desire is to hike the Appalachian Trail.

01:00:03.352 --> 01:00:07.212
And it's good to have that desire, and the desire is important, and hopefully it sticks with you the whole time.

01:00:07.212 --> 01:00:11.952
If that happens to be your goal, your purpose, in this case, is to hike that trail.

01:00:13.452 --> 01:00:17.252
But over time, as you do it, it becomes easier.

01:00:17.252 --> 01:00:21.812
You develop that habit, in this case, a number of habits that you need for long distance hiking.

01:00:22.812 --> 01:00:25.312
But the same thing is true in many other cases.

01:00:25.312 --> 01:00:36.312
You may start out with one particular kind of motivation, and it may be joined by others, or it may transmute into some other sort of motivation.

01:00:36.312 --> 01:00:40.132
In many cases, it's going to start out as a matter of sheer will.

01:00:41.212 --> 01:00:43.912
Working out is a good example of this.

01:00:43.912 --> 01:00:49.252
You may have the desire to lose weight, and that'll be part of your motivation.

01:00:50.272 --> 01:00:53.412
Your purpose is to get in shape, lose weight.

01:00:54.872 --> 01:01:12.832
But you're probably going to need just sheer will to get yourself off the couch, to get yourself out of bed, and to go to the gym, or to go walk your dog, to go cycling, whatever it happens to be, however you've chosen to get in shape and lose that weight.

01:01:12.832 --> 01:01:16.272
That is going to be unavoidable for many things.

01:01:16.272 --> 01:01:22.752
You are going to need to have that force of will within yourself to get started.

01:01:22.752 --> 01:01:29.332
Now of course, the goal is to turn that into that habit, to make it something that's simply part of your life.

01:01:29.332 --> 01:01:30.732
It's something you do.

01:01:30.732 --> 01:01:41.692
And so if it happens to be some form of cardio that you do every morning, it starts out as you forcing yourself as an act of will to do it.

01:01:41.692 --> 01:01:44.612
But then it becomes enjoyable, and it becomes a habit.

01:01:44.672 --> 01:01:48.692
It becomes part of just how you live your life.

01:01:50.112 --> 01:01:52.812
Once you do that, it becomes easier.

01:01:52.812 --> 01:01:57.052
That is the case with so many of these things, so many of these purposes.

01:01:57.052 --> 01:02:05.712
It starts out more difficult, and it becomes easier over time, because every human being is a creature of habit.

01:02:05.712 --> 01:02:09.172
We like to use that term and say, oh, he's a creature of habit.

01:02:09.912 --> 01:02:25.032
Of those for whom a particular habit, usually some thing, they do every single week, for instance, if you're someone who every Friday night, you're at a particular bar, you're a creature of habit with regard to that.

01:02:25.032 --> 01:02:28.392
And there are individuals for whom that is particularly true.

01:02:28.392 --> 01:02:30.792
But it is true for every single human being.

01:02:30.792 --> 01:02:32.952
We are all creatures of habit.

01:02:34.012 --> 01:02:38.092
And when you develop those habits, particularly, we're talking about good habits in this case.

01:02:38.692 --> 01:02:45.592
When you develop those habits, the motivation becomes easier, because it just becomes part of your life.

01:02:45.592 --> 01:02:47.632
It's part of how your day goes.

01:02:47.632 --> 01:02:48.692
It's part of your schedule.

01:02:48.692 --> 01:02:51.012
It's just normal for you.

01:02:52.292 --> 01:03:03.272
Habit is so much a part of human beings, so much a part of human psychology, that it's actually admissible in our courts.

01:03:03.272 --> 01:03:11.752
Our legal system recognizes how important and how salient, how powerful habit is.

01:03:11.752 --> 01:03:23.852
A good example of this, if you were to get into a collision of some kind, and there was for some reason a dispute over whether or not you had buckled your seatbelt.

01:03:25.772 --> 01:03:33.172
If you are the sort of person who buckles his seatbelt, every time you get into the car, I happen to be one of those.

01:03:33.172 --> 01:03:35.032
I get into the car, I buckle my seatbelt.

01:03:35.952 --> 01:03:42.592
That would be admissible as evidence that in that particular case, you had buckled your seatbelt.

01:03:42.592 --> 01:03:45.472
Because it's a matter of habit.

01:03:45.472 --> 01:03:50.512
The same thing works in so many other parts of life.

01:03:50.512 --> 01:03:54.952
Again, it may be difficult to get started with some of these things.

01:03:54.952 --> 01:04:02.012
It may be that just sheer force of will, just a naked exercise of forcing yourself to do something.

01:04:03.412 --> 01:04:08.012
And the next time, it will still be a matter of will.

01:04:08.012 --> 01:04:10.172
But there will be a little desire along with it.

01:04:10.172 --> 01:04:11.472
There will be some enjoyment.

01:04:11.472 --> 01:04:15.072
There will be some other motivation that has started to grow.

01:04:15.072 --> 01:04:17.772
And you will need to use a little less will.

01:04:17.772 --> 01:04:19.512
And over time, that continues.

01:04:19.512 --> 01:04:26.372
And eventually, you are just the sort of person who now wakes up at four in the morning to go swimming.

01:04:26.372 --> 01:04:27.972
Or maybe you are a night owl.

01:04:27.972 --> 01:04:29.152
You are not a morning person.

01:04:29.152 --> 01:04:29.952
You are not an early bird.

01:04:30.552 --> 01:04:32.572
And so, maybe it's ten o'clock and you go swimming.

01:04:32.572 --> 01:04:38.712
Whatever it happens to be, once you develop that habit, it becomes easier.

01:04:38.712 --> 01:04:42.652
And it makes you a better person because you are going to stick with it.

01:04:42.652 --> 01:04:45.132
It is something you have now internalized.

01:04:45.132 --> 01:04:49.592
You have taken that purpose that you decided you wanted to have.

01:04:49.592 --> 01:04:50.992
You wanted to achieve this thing.

01:04:50.992 --> 01:04:52.912
You wanted to do this thing.

01:04:52.912 --> 01:04:56.552
You did what was necessary to get started on that path.

01:04:56.552 --> 01:04:57.932
But now you have internalized it.

01:04:58.632 --> 01:05:00.652
Now it's part of who you are.

01:05:02.512 --> 01:05:07.732
That is how you develop new habits as a person.

01:05:07.732 --> 01:05:10.552
That is how you develop as a person.

01:05:13.392 --> 01:05:23.572
Psychologically speaking, the easiest thing for any individual to do is going to be something that has become a habit.

01:05:23.572 --> 01:05:28.492
In certain things, like with Woe's example of baseball, it's muscle memory.

01:05:28.492 --> 01:05:32.212
Muscle memory and habit are very similar things.

01:05:32.212 --> 01:05:35.372
Essentially, muscle memory is sort of a subset of habit.

01:05:35.372 --> 01:05:39.152
But once something turns into that habit, it just becomes easier.

01:05:39.152 --> 01:05:40.652
It becomes natural.

01:05:40.652 --> 01:05:42.472
It's no longer something that is difficult.

01:05:42.472 --> 01:05:44.552
You don't have to think about it.

01:05:44.552 --> 01:05:46.832
We all have these things in our lives.

01:05:46.832 --> 01:05:50.092
It may be how you prepare eggs in the morning for breakfast.

01:05:50.092 --> 01:05:52.452
It could be something as simple as that.

01:05:52.452 --> 01:06:00.212
You don't have to think about it at all because you have made so many fried eggs that you could basically do it in the dark half of sleep.

01:06:00.212 --> 01:06:01.952
And maybe you do some mornings.

01:06:04.032 --> 01:06:06.512
The challenge is starting.

01:06:06.512 --> 01:06:10.992
The challenge is that first step, because what is the hardest step in any hike?

01:06:10.992 --> 01:06:13.452
It's the first one.

01:06:13.452 --> 01:06:16.312
And that's the case with so many other things in life.

01:06:16.312 --> 01:06:20.272
The most difficult part is simply starting.

01:06:20.272 --> 01:06:23.112
And that's why it matters that you have that motivation.

01:06:23.192 --> 01:06:29.072
It's the difference between simply having the purpose and having the motivation.

01:06:29.072 --> 01:06:32.592
The purpose is to hike the Appalachian Trail.

01:06:32.592 --> 01:06:38.692
The motivation gets you to take the first step, and the second step, and the third step.

01:06:38.692 --> 01:06:43.972
And however many steps there are in all those miles, you need motivation for each and every one.

01:06:43.972 --> 01:06:46.472
Because the purpose alone is not enough.

01:06:46.472 --> 01:06:50.392
You need that fire that drives the engine, that drives you forward.

01:06:50.972 --> 01:06:57.472
And as we've said, for every man that's going to be different, it's going to be personal.

01:06:57.472 --> 01:07:01.232
Even for something like hiking the Appalachian Trail.

01:07:01.232 --> 01:07:08.752
For some, it will be the desire to see the trail, to see the natural world, to do that thing.

01:07:08.752 --> 01:07:15.352
For others, it will be more a matter of achievement, getting that triple crown, which is hiking all three of those trails.

01:07:16.972 --> 01:07:18.832
For most, it will be a combination of things.

01:07:19.752 --> 01:07:21.872
But the combination is going to be different.

01:07:21.872 --> 01:07:27.732
It may be for you, it's 10% desire, and for someone else, it's 80% desire.

01:07:27.732 --> 01:07:30.252
And that's why motivation is personal.

01:07:30.252 --> 01:07:32.932
You have to find that in yourself.

01:07:32.932 --> 01:07:38.212
Yes, again, starting out for many of these, it's going to be will is going to be the source of your motivation.

01:07:38.212 --> 01:07:40.892
It's going to be the fire that drives you forward.

01:07:40.892 --> 01:07:44.432
Because until you develop it into something else, it has to be will.

01:07:45.272 --> 01:07:51.512
Because will is what is the manifestation of that decision to do something.

01:07:51.512 --> 01:07:55.732
It is the translation of purpose into action.

01:07:55.732 --> 01:07:59.092
And action is what is actually living your life.

01:07:59.092 --> 01:08:00.532
Not just purpose.

01:08:00.532 --> 01:08:11.572
If you collect a bunch of purposes, a bunch of things that you think you'd like to achieve, you'd like to do in this life, but you never do any of them, what do those purposes mean?

01:08:13.052 --> 01:08:16.972
Purpose without motivation is purposeless.

01:08:16.972 --> 01:08:20.652
It's sort of like collecting books you never read.

01:08:20.652 --> 01:08:28.492
I'm not going to condemn any man for having a collection of books he hasn't read, because of course, there's something to be said for having the books.

01:08:28.492 --> 01:08:33.192
You can pass them to others, you can pass them down, people can borrow them.

01:08:33.192 --> 01:08:34.532
It's nice to have them.

01:08:34.532 --> 01:08:36.312
Maybe you like how they look.

01:08:37.552 --> 01:08:43.232
But you don't get the same thing out of having them on your shelves that you would get out of actually reading them.

01:08:43.232 --> 01:08:44.592
It's a different thing.

01:08:44.592 --> 01:08:49.612
There's the purpose and the motivation, and there is a division between them.

01:08:49.612 --> 01:08:53.212
You need both, or you will not get anything done.

01:08:54.332 --> 01:09:00.352
If you have motivation but no purpose, you're directionless, you're aimless, you wander through life.

01:09:00.352 --> 01:09:05.672
If you have purpose but no motivation, you never get anything done.

01:09:05.672 --> 01:09:08.032
That's apathy, essentially.

01:09:08.032 --> 01:09:09.012
You must have both.

01:09:09.912 --> 01:09:16.732
You must have the purpose, which is translating duty into something personal.

01:09:16.732 --> 01:09:19.432
It's taking the duty and making it your own.

01:09:19.432 --> 01:09:26.672
And then you must have the motivation that translates that purpose into action, because that is actually living.

01:09:26.672 --> 01:09:38.692
Not simply thinking about it, not simply desiring it, not simply having it as something intellectually that entertains you or something you think you'd like to go for at some point in life.

01:09:38.692 --> 01:09:46.952
No, you need the motivation, because you have to translate this into the doing, because it is in the doing that life is actually lived.