Motivation: the difference between brilliant & brainless, good & evil?
06 October 2017 [link youtube]
From both the teacher and the student's perspective, motivation is often discussed as a sort of meta-virtue, or even as a superpower, separating the exceptional from the mediocre and so on. However, most people think about motivation (both intellectually and ethically) in an overly vague sense, and here, instead, I reflect on (or philosophize about) motivation in education, in my own experience, with some degree of precision.
So, yes, I suppose I could have instead titled it, "Motivation & Education: Learning Languages, University & Life."
Youtube Automatic Transcription
yo what up so I'm currently employed as
both a teacher and a student very different capacities this is my girlfriend Melissa who for the first time of her life has become like a schoolteacher here in China for the last couple of months she's been teaching children we live in China it's a very unusual part of China we're surrounded by palm trees and tropical fruit that's a pomelo approximately the size of my head um oh here's one that's open to you know right yeah we're surrounded listen plan Russia's surrounded by giant tropical fruit and just outside the window there are palm trees we're on the border between yin Anna and Myanmar so culturally ethnically linguistically part of China fascinating beautiful book but she's been she's been teaching children here and I want to make a video talking about motivation motivation in education and learning for myself as an autodidact in a university context in learning languages in life one of the things that put this on my mind was actually seeing a video from vegan gains vegan gains talking of motivation in weight loss and weight lifting fitness and made me reflect on how in some ways motivation in language learning is similar and in some ways it's different for myself personally a lot of my life I've been a very mission based learner my motivation has been linked to a definite sense of a defined mission of outcomes I was pursuing and is true when I compare myself to other students or on a job and job setting other people who are working with me my very high levels of motivation it almost seems like a superpower you know it seemed like I was doing so much more than the people around me who were not motivated now whether it's from a teacher's standpoint or from a student standpoint I think there is a bit of a danger here motivation becomes fetishized and exaggerated in its significance as this kind of meta virtue the virtue of all virtues of a virtue that that's the basis for all other virtues for one thing because it's not so safe or easy for us to talk about differences in intelligence aptitude even preparation you know why is one student better than another well maybe one student has sober parents who are themselves school teachers who've really taught them how the system works and teach them how to study and help them with what they're doing at home and another student has parents who are angry alcoholics who hate the education system and don't help them this way you know there are differences like that that are not safe to talk about and what is safe to talk about from the educators perspective and I think even from students talking about themselves what's safe to talk about is motivation people can people can riff on this without without any danger of offending other people but it's really easy to kind of sort students in your own mind or even to explain to yourself while you perform well in some context and on others in terms of motivation say oh this this student isn't really very motivated this other student was super motivated so we did well see it this way and again it I think I think that's true when you look back in your own life it's really easy to say oh well I wasn't motivated at this time for this reason either thinking could be the triana versus every matter could be always busy with my ex-boyfriend Ursula you know there were other things in your mind there were other things you were doing where you can perceive your own performance purely in terms of motivation yeah I'm from a teacher's perspective you can pick out students like oh this work is performing better because he's more motivated or this one isn't because his parents just wanted to be here right right right right the parents want to be here in the child doesn't or something yeah yeah anyway whether it's in an adult workplace situation or children or university context it's really easy for motivation to take on this there's great importance without us maybe thinking too precisely about what motivation is and in this video that's exactly what I want to talk about is precisely what vision is and the way different types of motivation shape what you're doing now I think about human nature and the mind a lot in terms of instinct she's a difference to myself and the vast majority of philosophers have published on these things you know well I think one of these strongest motivations for human beings is fear and you can be motivated to learn by fear so I want to give two examples my own life I don't know I may have mentioned one of these to you we one of the examples when I was living in Laos during a certain period I lived in Laos for two and a half years but when I was living in the capital city of Laos I had a very real very pragmatic fear that at any could be taken over to the side of the road by corrupt police officers or corrupt army officials and it could might not be in this other but they once they came to my house to came to my bedroom so you could be interrogated by the police or army official than any time in lotion and most likely they'd be trying to just get money out of you you know they were trying to accuse you something you know it wouldn't be a sincere interrogation now so you say this is not a ludicrous fear or something other white people living in Laos at that time could also talk well no the vast majority of white people living in those conditions didn't the best manner of people didn't respond to it that way but for me that provided an impetus that provided a groaning and fear of I have to be ready to defend myself in in a legal sense of you know like give a defense of my character or what I'm here what I'm doing at any time at any time I could be taken over and interrogated any time I could be extorted that's really what it's trying to extort my fee by men in uniform and I have to be able to talk a good game so that is a fear-based motivation was very real but believe me I was surrounded by the white people living who didn't didn't respond to it that way at all some of them responded by just paying bribes or you know I mean I've had people at different different strategies whatever the series were I remember one woman and she probably wouldn't have gotten away with it she was a white woman she had a lotion boyfriend and whenever policemen or soldiers tried to interrogate her questions way she just looked straight ahead ignored them and drove away or walked away and again I think you know I think it is just because she was old she's a woman she was a white woman they didn't just pounce on or handcuff or beat her or whatever you know like you can't you can't do that she was she was living there for a couple of years you know this you know don't actually actually see for this advice like okay so I think she did give news I think she gave new arrivals that advice but I was a little bit too old in the game but I was leaning her like dude what what are you yeah yeah but also for me like if this is my home I was living there permanently for my you know yeah if you're just a tourist or something that's different but you know come on this is this is my hood this is my hood who the are you you know if you're gonna Tara gate me I've gotta stand up so yeah this is my home I'm not from anywhere else and that time that was really true I didn't have a home back in Canada or anywhere else anyway so that is an example and that that fear-based pressure and you know it doesn't mean I'm wake up in the morning and I'm trembling in fear that is a powerful motivation and I did really learn lotion like ten times faster than the other white people around me yes there were other inequalities involved there inequalities of intelligence and preparation or what have you but I had no formal education in any of this stuff I mean Canada I'd never studied linguistics at that time I have now you know now I studied linguistics many years later you know I had no formal education nothing I mean there was nothing I have political science degree there was nothing at the only language I'd formally studied at that point French and German you know I mean but you know I was able to do it so another you know kind of for me dramatic more short-term example of fear based learning I was sharing an apartment with my ex-wife in England so we were living in England this is when we were in our own apartment not before we had a house we shared with another person sharing the rents on the house this is been in a small apartment and there was a date on the calendar and at first I didn't know the date cuz I didn't bought the airplane tickets yet and then I knew the exact date we bought it but there was a date coming up when I was gonna have to fly to Cambodia and I knew I'd been to Cambodia before short term but I'd never lived there before like permanently and I knew exactly what I was gonna have to deal with executives gonna have to struggle with when I got to Cambodia so in terms of its like alright I'm gonna have to get off the airplane I'm gonna have no cellular phone I'd never owned a cellular phone up until age 36 or something I'm gonna have no bank account all the money in the world I have is gonna be in my boot or hidden in different pockets and Phnom Penh at that time again this is not hysteria it was a city where people get hold up at gunpoint in the streets and I myself knew two different white people who were held at gunpoint it's not like not like I was making a survey you know you know and actually from the from the rooftop of my apartment building not infrequently you'd hear gunshots going off you know pea Phnom Penh was the real deal at that time was a third world dangerous city in transition and again keep in mind naturally criminals are gonna single out someone who's white Western and looks wealthy from their perspective what are you gonna do say to the criminals why don't you guys focus your energy on on on robbing the indigent poor why would you focused on robbing your fellow Cambodians or farmers or homeless people no obviously they're gonna Rob somebody who looks like me whether whether I'm rich or broke you can't blame them you know you're you're a target scribe and no but apart from the crime and dangerous but there was just the difficulty where was like I'm gonna get off this airplane I'm gonna be on the streets of pnom pen and I'm gonna have to find an apartment to run I'm gonna have to find out landlord you know in for out of a hotel room and I did already have a job lined up I did have a job that's you know what I was going at that time I was gonna start this this job in Cambodia but I knew exactly how tough that challenge was and how high and I had a couple of weeks in that apartment in in England and I was waking up as early as I could wake up and working as hard as I could possibly work you know somewhere it's just when you're when you're nervous and scared as I think it is I think it is really appropriate so I would fear in this context fear isn't motivation somedays I woke up at 6:30 a.m. somedays I probably worked up at woke up at 5:30 a.m. you know but like I was waking up full of nervous energy and pouring as much you know energies that possibly could into learning learning basic Cambodian which is an incredibly difficult language to learn by the way and I mean I remember once so I think it's the only time my life when I've wept just due to stress where I broke down weeping and I wasn't like you know it wasn't sad it wasn't upset but I was just so pushing myself to the limit again not even in terms of the number of hours in the day I was studying but the intensity of it so I mean again that was fear as the motivation for learning and it will again not an abstract not unreasonable fear I'd been to pnom Penn I knew exactly what it was putting himself into and I was right and when I got there I mean that was my situation I had no bank account my money and but-- and you know walk those streets and I did I did find a landlord you know while I was staying in a hotel you know I had to go around and you know literally like walk the streets of the Phnom Penh and look for little signs up saying for rent saying for rent in Cambodian and talk to the landlord in Cambodian that's that's what that challenge is right and you're also trying to evaluate like is this landlord gonna rob let's well it's well yeah as you gonna ripped me off on the price but also am I gonna move in here and then one one then one day all my stuff is still one because it's the most likely person to rob you as your own landlord or your landlord has his brother come over something you know ass you really got you got a judge anyway so fear as a motivation I think is normally left out of the discussion these things and it's it's probably the single most intense and effective motivation probably today you can see that with people like war refugees or other people who are actually I do remember once seeing in a documentary about a guy in a refugee camp who taught himself English in only a few months and this kind of thing you know you do sometimes see see evidence of that okay so so for me that's a separate heading I think so I think fear-based movies I had four types of motivation and one's have mentioned this video without we get to them see I think that's authority based motivation or you could say authoritarianism I think that is different and some people respond to that really positively some don't and some respond to pause look for some subjects but not others right yeah so when I was a kid when I was younger I really I mean a teenager I really noticed that I got more work done if I was sitting in a library no no we're not even using the books you know I mean like just using the book I brought with me you know but that sitting in a library was more effective than sitting in my own desk you know and I was aware well it's just the kind of authoritarian Ambulance of the setting you know and I'm getting more word and that's not true of me today I think for me as a fully grown adult I get exactly the same amount of work done at my desk and at the library you know I mean but sure ages 16 to 22 I think that was really true of me that you know just putting yourself in that putting some in library and I think we're a lot of people if you think about what you get out of organized education at a university in many ways it's not much it's like okay so here's a reading list like you know here's a photocopied syllabus or reading list for you to go home and and work with there are the books and here's the essay you're supposed to write you don't need a professor you don't need a classroom to do that you could just give yourself for reading whether you get download one off the internet go to the library of the work for a lot of people the main thing they're getting out of the university context is motivation in exactly that sense the authoritarian motivation and indeed you know do teachers beat students I think that's part of it too I think it's part of a belief in authoritarian motivation again I think it's both the case that some people will respond more positive out than others and it also really depends on the subject matter like maybe you can't learn math that way but you can learn you maybe respond positive with some other topic you know the type of learning yeah so I think I think that's a tricky one but I would mention I think just as with fear people that need to learn to embrace fear that fear is an instinct we all live with you know what I mean like not to demonize it not to do this not to do that I think likewise you can learn to have a kind of positive attitude towards those that authoritarian side of your own nature if you have it to some extent and you know you can put yourself in that setting probably if you're watching this in a major city even if you're not a university student you can choose to go and do your work in university library you know you can pay the five bucks for the membership card I mean most universities are like that you know they'll allow in Outsiders under certain circumstances you can put yourself in an archives or a university setting to get worked on and I got my best work done at this Michigan Law Library is beautiful and she was not not a law student she wasn't studying law talking about the authoritarian atmosphere and the rule was to be completely silent and that really benefitted me you know certain there was a the undergraduate library was just too loved well I think I mean I think one of these sure her university education was at a famous university in the States but you had all class sizes that were too big when you have smaller class sizes and one of the things that motivates students is the feeling that they will let the professor down so I don't know if you ever were close enough to a professor to feel that way well it's like if I don't do my best work on that so again the professor isn't gonna beat you but I'll be letting the professor down that can be a powerful motivator also so for myself the main for motivation in my life has been why I called mission based learning and I generally I don't really encourage people to use this this mode of learning was mode of motivation for me it's much more tragic than it is well it's more tragic than there's anything else for me I'm someone who had really really high really really intense levels of motivation for learning languages studying history studying politics but in each case it's linked to a particular mission a particular outcome I'm in pursuit of so you know I'm not I'm not studying Korean at Jib way for the good of my health or something you know I'm really on this mission where there's a vision of a career and humanitarian motives and research motives and outcomes I'm pursuing and very often I seem to be it does seem like a superpower it seems like I'm getting so much more done and learning so much more so much faster than all the other people around me but the flipside of that is then when the mission comes to an end and most of these missions for me ended in failure where I had to stop learning Cree then it's a crushing disappointment it's it brings about terrible Sophia suffering it's a real personal tragedy it's a personal tragedy that first and foremost impacts me much more and much more deeply than for example the death of my own father which really didn't impact me that much you know I regard death as part of life you know it doesn't come as a shock and my father died of natural causes at a very old age that's not very shocking I mean the death of my various grandparents like why is it's like well did you think they live forever you know it's not not that tragic but sure when I've put in hundreds of hours of intense effort to try to memorize the names of the months in creve for example there are 12 months of the year in Creole really long words you're trying to do basic math and create learn the numbers you know every language has this learning numbers and the months and the seasons and a lot of vocabulary just to get started in language and then boom the the mission is over I'm never gonna use this again and I look back on it almost feels like brain damage you know it's not only that I don't have something positive this it looks like negative in my life now I've sunk all this effort in and really like a part of my brain capacity into this and now it's over and I'm never gonna be able to use it again for me that's really tragic and really harrowing and I've been through it again and again and again now I think the stereotypical University student we've just been reading a lot about this moderately lacks this form of motivation a stereotypical I think it's probably the majority of stereotypical University student United States in Canada doesn't know what they want to study doesn't know why they're there they will often openly say they're just having to look around at different options they're considering different subjects that - they're trying to find what fits trying to find what they like trying to find what motivates this kind of thing I appreciate their honesty it's fine but that is completely antithetical to the type of mission based motivation I'm talking about right and for me again the missions whether it was learning Cambodian or learning lotion or learning poly this is a long series of languages very clear very powerful link to humanitarian work research real-world outcomes yeah and not just a credential right oh yeah but for me none of them none of them are only two acronyms are actually ironically sure yeah yeah so mission based motivation I've got to say if you look at a snapshot of it and a lot of people who met me in each of those fields they found it really inspiring to meet me and I'm sorry I'm not boasting I'm not exactly but I met people okay so for example I'd meet someone with a PhD someone who was a professor or an archivist you know did not always professor soon as they work in the library or archives and they'll be so inspired to meet me because the people they were dealing with were always people who either had no motivation or had this kind of negative dragging their ass motivation you know was like who you just got to do this thing to get through my MA I don't really want to assemble thing like even if they were dealing with MA and PhD students and then they meet me I wasn't in a ph.d program but I was so positive motivated that was really making progress and so a lot of those people they really lit up when they met me and I'd be such a contrast to the other students or other researchers they dealt with like even with journalists you can deal with journalists urges like I'm on this assignment seriously I met journals of that in Cambodia so some newspaper had paid for their airplane ticket to fly but they're like oh I don't even know why I have to cover this court case in Cambodia I mean you know nobody cares it's natural you can relate to it so having that motivation in a lot of ways in my life as a positive thing and I did get a huge amount done in all those languages in a relatively short span of time but the flip side is the the soro the sense of personal tragedy I want to include this in the video but look like I wept when I gave away my lotion dictionary it's not because the dictionary was worth a lot of money but I remember when I gave because it's everything it represented it's like well right that's two and a half years of hard work and sometimes unbelievably hard work you know with no electricity under a mosquito net it wasn't like that in the capital city but at when I was doing humanitarian work you know living in these really extreme rugged conditions and now I'm giving this book away and I'm never gonna use this language again like Laos and unless I go to the suburbs of Paris who's even going to speak loshon with me you know what I mean we saw one lotion guy we were good I couldn't do it I couldn't snap back into language that quickly because I've been speaking three other way I was speaking French and Chinese and Thai anyway yeah so whatever within that month I've been speaking three or four there languages so anyway but yeah oh yeah yeah I just said a couple words to him in loud then he was all excited willing to speak to be in motion but I couldn't I couldn't snap back that question anyway actually and after we walked away from him then already you was coming back to me anyway look when I gave away that that dictionary I mean that that whole scenario was a really deep personal tragedy for me the end of that mission that had motivated me so much and I was surrounded by people who totally couldn't comprehend it and didn't care you know see you sir what kind of white people around you there I was in Thailand and then I went up to China to you now at that time so you know so the average white person who's either on vacation in Thailand or retired in Thailand or even who has some kind of job as an ESL teacher these are just people enjoying life they have none of that humanitarian motivation none of that research motivation and they don't they don't get it you know what I mean now I think also as a white person in Canada when I had the crushing blow of having to stop studying Korean a jib way I'm surrounded by white people just don't go there like you know what's the problem you know I go you should get a job in marketing yes oh you should you should get a job in real estate you'll be great and it's like dude this you know do you have any idea what's just happened in the last couple years of my life like what I've gone through what I've lost and what position I'm in now in terms of my own lost potential and my own sense of what lost brain tissue so you know that's a know but for me as a large self I mean nobody ever says that to me like maybe that's a gendered thing nobody ever says you why do you think you're special you know so maybe I do a good job of presenting here's why I'm special yeah sure sure defensive and or offensive about it yeah so the fourth I don't know if we gone through I think we've gone through all four the fourth and final type of mode of learning and motivation for learning I want to mention there's a quote that's cool like y'all know you want you can eat noodles on camera - yeah you got you got those young you need on camera look you know the fourth and final tip I wanted to mention is that from this comment from Francis Bacon Francis Bacon is a philosopher and really his most important work is the Novum organum which is very rarely read people don't read that book I don't know why it is his most important work of philosophy but in and he says the the ideal state of mind for learning is one that combines playfulness and seriousness this is a this is a we are simultaneously being very playful and very serious as an interesting comment I think a lot of people do talk about play and playfulness and learning but that's actually a really strange tightrope to walk you know what I mean if you think about because I mean play is one thing but if you don't have a very specific kind of motivation play is just play and it's not really learning you know what I mean yeah there are elements of play and language learning and language teaching but I mean that's maybe the most rare and difficult to sustain of attitudes you know I mean well even for me with Chinese you don't see me playing a lot of games with Chinese you don't see me having a lot of fun learning Chinese and now advanced enough you know what I mean whether it's Chinese or lotion or crea I can sit and I can cut up some words on a little piece of paper and throw them on the floor and play some kind of game or something but it's it's tough and it's rare I mean Francis Bacon was mostly thinking about the sciences of trying to keep a playful yeah okay trying to keep it okay well you okay but you've just been doing that how successful are you with play and learning because I think like with your students I would say most of the time when it's play it's just play so I look for me I don't know but maybe I'm just the wrong person to speak on that but I think that's actually a really difficult it's kind of easy to plan that for for little kids even older as old as you know as young as like teenage age like how do you play so the four types of uncover your mission based learning fear motivated learning which may be really overlooked the role of authoritarian even if it's just the atmosphere of authority like being in a library in learning and then this kind of question for me opening question of play play based learning and so I've mentioned this to you recently back when I was studying Korean a jib way especially when we worked with some other languages too yeah when I work with poly and so I tried to get in touch with video game programmers and talked to several saying why can't we have software that allows people to at least practice these languages maybe not completely educational so far why can't we translate Pokemon into Kriya Ojibwe li you know what card based game so that at least the words are there and being practiced and so on can't we do something along these lines so I have taken an interest in play based language education and the role of play and at least practicing vocabulary and so on but it's and there is goddamn little out there there is very little even for a language like Japanese I really searched through all the software for a learning Japanese education I found nothing well film go next to nothing but Chinese says Chinese has a billion speakers and probably a hundred million people learning it because there's so many people in the West and even in other countries in Asia you know in Korea and so on and there is next to nothing so it is weird maybe that'll make a comeback but right now the role of play and learning obviously video games just one example he needs wooden blocks for all I care there all kinds of ways to incorporate play into learning it seems to be it seems to be really really waning right now really weak Chinese educational walks so my basic warning in this video it's funny motivation is perceived as this kind of meta virtue as what separates good students from bad students and even what separates good people from bad people you know why is he good person but because of how he's motivated you know like oh yes he has bad motives he has bad intentions we thinking about it in in this way but I think moto vation runs deep everyone knows that and I do think when you're talking about like what motivated me to learn the Lao language why did I make so much progress really in one year with leverage I got up to a level Lao was the only language I've learned where I couldn't make jokes that really made people laugh I would be able to spontaneously make original jokes and Lao people would really break a lot they really appreciated my sense of humor I'm not at that level in Chinese still to this day I don't think I've once told an original joke in Chinese that made people why not before once about very different very different time in my life and very different language I don't know I never I never made up in the original jokes and we bought strawberries once and you told them like that that I'm crazy it's not a problem for me it was a problem for you right you're right you're right right okay so that I made a joke with some strawberry vendors that that even though I'm stupid it's not really my problem it's their problem right yeah that that may be the only joke I made in Chinese that made people and they did laughs that's right we had a whole group of people and they laughed yeah I said yeah I'm stupid but but it's not my problem like I'm not embarrassed to admit you that I'm stupid you know you're the ones who have to figure out how many kilograms of strawberries I'm buying here not me so if I'm stupid it's your problem yeah okay great so thanks my girlfriend saved know that I made one joke one joke ever in Chinese that afterwards I explained to you what the why everyone was laughing right but look motivation runs deep it runs all the way deep and for me the the the extremely high levels of motivation I had whether I was cracking the books during that short period of time with Cambodian in that apartment or over long periods of time thing which is like palette lotion which I had no teacher in I had no teacher I had no help I had no encouragement I had no textbooks and to make my own textbooks for some of those languages being super highly motivated for some of these things also was linked to a tremendously deep soul destroying personal tragedy that many people can't relate to I mean that that is kind of the ongoing tragedy of my life as much as I've injured suffering under other headings with the death of my father being separated from my daughter which is incredibly harrowing like you say to people routinely look actually the real defining tragedy my life is higher education in Canada the university system and these things so yeah that's my judgment on that's my judgment on motivation as a highly motivated out of Didact for the most part when I talk to people about it I warned them against it because I'm I warned them about the real drawbacks the real extent to which your own personal sorrow and suffering is involved if you if you take this path all right
both a teacher and a student very different capacities this is my girlfriend Melissa who for the first time of her life has become like a schoolteacher here in China for the last couple of months she's been teaching children we live in China it's a very unusual part of China we're surrounded by palm trees and tropical fruit that's a pomelo approximately the size of my head um oh here's one that's open to you know right yeah we're surrounded listen plan Russia's surrounded by giant tropical fruit and just outside the window there are palm trees we're on the border between yin Anna and Myanmar so culturally ethnically linguistically part of China fascinating beautiful book but she's been she's been teaching children here and I want to make a video talking about motivation motivation in education and learning for myself as an autodidact in a university context in learning languages in life one of the things that put this on my mind was actually seeing a video from vegan gains vegan gains talking of motivation in weight loss and weight lifting fitness and made me reflect on how in some ways motivation in language learning is similar and in some ways it's different for myself personally a lot of my life I've been a very mission based learner my motivation has been linked to a definite sense of a defined mission of outcomes I was pursuing and is true when I compare myself to other students or on a job and job setting other people who are working with me my very high levels of motivation it almost seems like a superpower you know it seemed like I was doing so much more than the people around me who were not motivated now whether it's from a teacher's standpoint or from a student standpoint I think there is a bit of a danger here motivation becomes fetishized and exaggerated in its significance as this kind of meta virtue the virtue of all virtues of a virtue that that's the basis for all other virtues for one thing because it's not so safe or easy for us to talk about differences in intelligence aptitude even preparation you know why is one student better than another well maybe one student has sober parents who are themselves school teachers who've really taught them how the system works and teach them how to study and help them with what they're doing at home and another student has parents who are angry alcoholics who hate the education system and don't help them this way you know there are differences like that that are not safe to talk about and what is safe to talk about from the educators perspective and I think even from students talking about themselves what's safe to talk about is motivation people can people can riff on this without without any danger of offending other people but it's really easy to kind of sort students in your own mind or even to explain to yourself while you perform well in some context and on others in terms of motivation say oh this this student isn't really very motivated this other student was super motivated so we did well see it this way and again it I think I think that's true when you look back in your own life it's really easy to say oh well I wasn't motivated at this time for this reason either thinking could be the triana versus every matter could be always busy with my ex-boyfriend Ursula you know there were other things in your mind there were other things you were doing where you can perceive your own performance purely in terms of motivation yeah I'm from a teacher's perspective you can pick out students like oh this work is performing better because he's more motivated or this one isn't because his parents just wanted to be here right right right right the parents want to be here in the child doesn't or something yeah yeah anyway whether it's in an adult workplace situation or children or university context it's really easy for motivation to take on this there's great importance without us maybe thinking too precisely about what motivation is and in this video that's exactly what I want to talk about is precisely what vision is and the way different types of motivation shape what you're doing now I think about human nature and the mind a lot in terms of instinct she's a difference to myself and the vast majority of philosophers have published on these things you know well I think one of these strongest motivations for human beings is fear and you can be motivated to learn by fear so I want to give two examples my own life I don't know I may have mentioned one of these to you we one of the examples when I was living in Laos during a certain period I lived in Laos for two and a half years but when I was living in the capital city of Laos I had a very real very pragmatic fear that at any could be taken over to the side of the road by corrupt police officers or corrupt army officials and it could might not be in this other but they once they came to my house to came to my bedroom so you could be interrogated by the police or army official than any time in lotion and most likely they'd be trying to just get money out of you you know they were trying to accuse you something you know it wouldn't be a sincere interrogation now so you say this is not a ludicrous fear or something other white people living in Laos at that time could also talk well no the vast majority of white people living in those conditions didn't the best manner of people didn't respond to it that way but for me that provided an impetus that provided a groaning and fear of I have to be ready to defend myself in in a legal sense of you know like give a defense of my character or what I'm here what I'm doing at any time at any time I could be taken over and interrogated any time I could be extorted that's really what it's trying to extort my fee by men in uniform and I have to be able to talk a good game so that is a fear-based motivation was very real but believe me I was surrounded by the white people living who didn't didn't respond to it that way at all some of them responded by just paying bribes or you know I mean I've had people at different different strategies whatever the series were I remember one woman and she probably wouldn't have gotten away with it she was a white woman she had a lotion boyfriend and whenever policemen or soldiers tried to interrogate her questions way she just looked straight ahead ignored them and drove away or walked away and again I think you know I think it is just because she was old she's a woman she was a white woman they didn't just pounce on or handcuff or beat her or whatever you know like you can't you can't do that she was she was living there for a couple of years you know this you know don't actually actually see for this advice like okay so I think she did give news I think she gave new arrivals that advice but I was a little bit too old in the game but I was leaning her like dude what what are you yeah yeah but also for me like if this is my home I was living there permanently for my you know yeah if you're just a tourist or something that's different but you know come on this is this is my hood this is my hood who the are you you know if you're gonna Tara gate me I've gotta stand up so yeah this is my home I'm not from anywhere else and that time that was really true I didn't have a home back in Canada or anywhere else anyway so that is an example and that that fear-based pressure and you know it doesn't mean I'm wake up in the morning and I'm trembling in fear that is a powerful motivation and I did really learn lotion like ten times faster than the other white people around me yes there were other inequalities involved there inequalities of intelligence and preparation or what have you but I had no formal education in any of this stuff I mean Canada I'd never studied linguistics at that time I have now you know now I studied linguistics many years later you know I had no formal education nothing I mean there was nothing I have political science degree there was nothing at the only language I'd formally studied at that point French and German you know I mean but you know I was able to do it so another you know kind of for me dramatic more short-term example of fear based learning I was sharing an apartment with my ex-wife in England so we were living in England this is when we were in our own apartment not before we had a house we shared with another person sharing the rents on the house this is been in a small apartment and there was a date on the calendar and at first I didn't know the date cuz I didn't bought the airplane tickets yet and then I knew the exact date we bought it but there was a date coming up when I was gonna have to fly to Cambodia and I knew I'd been to Cambodia before short term but I'd never lived there before like permanently and I knew exactly what I was gonna have to deal with executives gonna have to struggle with when I got to Cambodia so in terms of its like alright I'm gonna have to get off the airplane I'm gonna have no cellular phone I'd never owned a cellular phone up until age 36 or something I'm gonna have no bank account all the money in the world I have is gonna be in my boot or hidden in different pockets and Phnom Penh at that time again this is not hysteria it was a city where people get hold up at gunpoint in the streets and I myself knew two different white people who were held at gunpoint it's not like not like I was making a survey you know you know and actually from the from the rooftop of my apartment building not infrequently you'd hear gunshots going off you know pea Phnom Penh was the real deal at that time was a third world dangerous city in transition and again keep in mind naturally criminals are gonna single out someone who's white Western and looks wealthy from their perspective what are you gonna do say to the criminals why don't you guys focus your energy on on on robbing the indigent poor why would you focused on robbing your fellow Cambodians or farmers or homeless people no obviously they're gonna Rob somebody who looks like me whether whether I'm rich or broke you can't blame them you know you're you're a target scribe and no but apart from the crime and dangerous but there was just the difficulty where was like I'm gonna get off this airplane I'm gonna be on the streets of pnom pen and I'm gonna have to find an apartment to run I'm gonna have to find out landlord you know in for out of a hotel room and I did already have a job lined up I did have a job that's you know what I was going at that time I was gonna start this this job in Cambodia but I knew exactly how tough that challenge was and how high and I had a couple of weeks in that apartment in in England and I was waking up as early as I could wake up and working as hard as I could possibly work you know somewhere it's just when you're when you're nervous and scared as I think it is I think it is really appropriate so I would fear in this context fear isn't motivation somedays I woke up at 6:30 a.m. somedays I probably worked up at woke up at 5:30 a.m. you know but like I was waking up full of nervous energy and pouring as much you know energies that possibly could into learning learning basic Cambodian which is an incredibly difficult language to learn by the way and I mean I remember once so I think it's the only time my life when I've wept just due to stress where I broke down weeping and I wasn't like you know it wasn't sad it wasn't upset but I was just so pushing myself to the limit again not even in terms of the number of hours in the day I was studying but the intensity of it so I mean again that was fear as the motivation for learning and it will again not an abstract not unreasonable fear I'd been to pnom Penn I knew exactly what it was putting himself into and I was right and when I got there I mean that was my situation I had no bank account my money and but-- and you know walk those streets and I did I did find a landlord you know while I was staying in a hotel you know I had to go around and you know literally like walk the streets of the Phnom Penh and look for little signs up saying for rent saying for rent in Cambodian and talk to the landlord in Cambodian that's that's what that challenge is right and you're also trying to evaluate like is this landlord gonna rob let's well it's well yeah as you gonna ripped me off on the price but also am I gonna move in here and then one one then one day all my stuff is still one because it's the most likely person to rob you as your own landlord or your landlord has his brother come over something you know ass you really got you got a judge anyway so fear as a motivation I think is normally left out of the discussion these things and it's it's probably the single most intense and effective motivation probably today you can see that with people like war refugees or other people who are actually I do remember once seeing in a documentary about a guy in a refugee camp who taught himself English in only a few months and this kind of thing you know you do sometimes see see evidence of that okay so so for me that's a separate heading I think so I think fear-based movies I had four types of motivation and one's have mentioned this video without we get to them see I think that's authority based motivation or you could say authoritarianism I think that is different and some people respond to that really positively some don't and some respond to pause look for some subjects but not others right yeah so when I was a kid when I was younger I really I mean a teenager I really noticed that I got more work done if I was sitting in a library no no we're not even using the books you know I mean like just using the book I brought with me you know but that sitting in a library was more effective than sitting in my own desk you know and I was aware well it's just the kind of authoritarian Ambulance of the setting you know and I'm getting more word and that's not true of me today I think for me as a fully grown adult I get exactly the same amount of work done at my desk and at the library you know I mean but sure ages 16 to 22 I think that was really true of me that you know just putting yourself in that putting some in library and I think we're a lot of people if you think about what you get out of organized education at a university in many ways it's not much it's like okay so here's a reading list like you know here's a photocopied syllabus or reading list for you to go home and and work with there are the books and here's the essay you're supposed to write you don't need a professor you don't need a classroom to do that you could just give yourself for reading whether you get download one off the internet go to the library of the work for a lot of people the main thing they're getting out of the university context is motivation in exactly that sense the authoritarian motivation and indeed you know do teachers beat students I think that's part of it too I think it's part of a belief in authoritarian motivation again I think it's both the case that some people will respond more positive out than others and it also really depends on the subject matter like maybe you can't learn math that way but you can learn you maybe respond positive with some other topic you know the type of learning yeah so I think I think that's a tricky one but I would mention I think just as with fear people that need to learn to embrace fear that fear is an instinct we all live with you know what I mean like not to demonize it not to do this not to do that I think likewise you can learn to have a kind of positive attitude towards those that authoritarian side of your own nature if you have it to some extent and you know you can put yourself in that setting probably if you're watching this in a major city even if you're not a university student you can choose to go and do your work in university library you know you can pay the five bucks for the membership card I mean most universities are like that you know they'll allow in Outsiders under certain circumstances you can put yourself in an archives or a university setting to get worked on and I got my best work done at this Michigan Law Library is beautiful and she was not not a law student she wasn't studying law talking about the authoritarian atmosphere and the rule was to be completely silent and that really benefitted me you know certain there was a the undergraduate library was just too loved well I think I mean I think one of these sure her university education was at a famous university in the States but you had all class sizes that were too big when you have smaller class sizes and one of the things that motivates students is the feeling that they will let the professor down so I don't know if you ever were close enough to a professor to feel that way well it's like if I don't do my best work on that so again the professor isn't gonna beat you but I'll be letting the professor down that can be a powerful motivator also so for myself the main for motivation in my life has been why I called mission based learning and I generally I don't really encourage people to use this this mode of learning was mode of motivation for me it's much more tragic than it is well it's more tragic than there's anything else for me I'm someone who had really really high really really intense levels of motivation for learning languages studying history studying politics but in each case it's linked to a particular mission a particular outcome I'm in pursuit of so you know I'm not I'm not studying Korean at Jib way for the good of my health or something you know I'm really on this mission where there's a vision of a career and humanitarian motives and research motives and outcomes I'm pursuing and very often I seem to be it does seem like a superpower it seems like I'm getting so much more done and learning so much more so much faster than all the other people around me but the flipside of that is then when the mission comes to an end and most of these missions for me ended in failure where I had to stop learning Cree then it's a crushing disappointment it's it brings about terrible Sophia suffering it's a real personal tragedy it's a personal tragedy that first and foremost impacts me much more and much more deeply than for example the death of my own father which really didn't impact me that much you know I regard death as part of life you know it doesn't come as a shock and my father died of natural causes at a very old age that's not very shocking I mean the death of my various grandparents like why is it's like well did you think they live forever you know it's not not that tragic but sure when I've put in hundreds of hours of intense effort to try to memorize the names of the months in creve for example there are 12 months of the year in Creole really long words you're trying to do basic math and create learn the numbers you know every language has this learning numbers and the months and the seasons and a lot of vocabulary just to get started in language and then boom the the mission is over I'm never gonna use this again and I look back on it almost feels like brain damage you know it's not only that I don't have something positive this it looks like negative in my life now I've sunk all this effort in and really like a part of my brain capacity into this and now it's over and I'm never gonna be able to use it again for me that's really tragic and really harrowing and I've been through it again and again and again now I think the stereotypical University student we've just been reading a lot about this moderately lacks this form of motivation a stereotypical I think it's probably the majority of stereotypical University student United States in Canada doesn't know what they want to study doesn't know why they're there they will often openly say they're just having to look around at different options they're considering different subjects that - they're trying to find what fits trying to find what they like trying to find what motivates this kind of thing I appreciate their honesty it's fine but that is completely antithetical to the type of mission based motivation I'm talking about right and for me again the missions whether it was learning Cambodian or learning lotion or learning poly this is a long series of languages very clear very powerful link to humanitarian work research real-world outcomes yeah and not just a credential right oh yeah but for me none of them none of them are only two acronyms are actually ironically sure yeah yeah so mission based motivation I've got to say if you look at a snapshot of it and a lot of people who met me in each of those fields they found it really inspiring to meet me and I'm sorry I'm not boasting I'm not exactly but I met people okay so for example I'd meet someone with a PhD someone who was a professor or an archivist you know did not always professor soon as they work in the library or archives and they'll be so inspired to meet me because the people they were dealing with were always people who either had no motivation or had this kind of negative dragging their ass motivation you know was like who you just got to do this thing to get through my MA I don't really want to assemble thing like even if they were dealing with MA and PhD students and then they meet me I wasn't in a ph.d program but I was so positive motivated that was really making progress and so a lot of those people they really lit up when they met me and I'd be such a contrast to the other students or other researchers they dealt with like even with journalists you can deal with journalists urges like I'm on this assignment seriously I met journals of that in Cambodia so some newspaper had paid for their airplane ticket to fly but they're like oh I don't even know why I have to cover this court case in Cambodia I mean you know nobody cares it's natural you can relate to it so having that motivation in a lot of ways in my life as a positive thing and I did get a huge amount done in all those languages in a relatively short span of time but the flip side is the the soro the sense of personal tragedy I want to include this in the video but look like I wept when I gave away my lotion dictionary it's not because the dictionary was worth a lot of money but I remember when I gave because it's everything it represented it's like well right that's two and a half years of hard work and sometimes unbelievably hard work you know with no electricity under a mosquito net it wasn't like that in the capital city but at when I was doing humanitarian work you know living in these really extreme rugged conditions and now I'm giving this book away and I'm never gonna use this language again like Laos and unless I go to the suburbs of Paris who's even going to speak loshon with me you know what I mean we saw one lotion guy we were good I couldn't do it I couldn't snap back into language that quickly because I've been speaking three other way I was speaking French and Chinese and Thai anyway yeah so whatever within that month I've been speaking three or four there languages so anyway but yeah oh yeah yeah I just said a couple words to him in loud then he was all excited willing to speak to be in motion but I couldn't I couldn't snap back that question anyway actually and after we walked away from him then already you was coming back to me anyway look when I gave away that that dictionary I mean that that whole scenario was a really deep personal tragedy for me the end of that mission that had motivated me so much and I was surrounded by people who totally couldn't comprehend it and didn't care you know see you sir what kind of white people around you there I was in Thailand and then I went up to China to you now at that time so you know so the average white person who's either on vacation in Thailand or retired in Thailand or even who has some kind of job as an ESL teacher these are just people enjoying life they have none of that humanitarian motivation none of that research motivation and they don't they don't get it you know what I mean now I think also as a white person in Canada when I had the crushing blow of having to stop studying Korean a jib way I'm surrounded by white people just don't go there like you know what's the problem you know I go you should get a job in marketing yes oh you should you should get a job in real estate you'll be great and it's like dude this you know do you have any idea what's just happened in the last couple years of my life like what I've gone through what I've lost and what position I'm in now in terms of my own lost potential and my own sense of what lost brain tissue so you know that's a know but for me as a large self I mean nobody ever says that to me like maybe that's a gendered thing nobody ever says you why do you think you're special you know so maybe I do a good job of presenting here's why I'm special yeah sure sure defensive and or offensive about it yeah so the fourth I don't know if we gone through I think we've gone through all four the fourth and final type of mode of learning and motivation for learning I want to mention there's a quote that's cool like y'all know you want you can eat noodles on camera - yeah you got you got those young you need on camera look you know the fourth and final tip I wanted to mention is that from this comment from Francis Bacon Francis Bacon is a philosopher and really his most important work is the Novum organum which is very rarely read people don't read that book I don't know why it is his most important work of philosophy but in and he says the the ideal state of mind for learning is one that combines playfulness and seriousness this is a this is a we are simultaneously being very playful and very serious as an interesting comment I think a lot of people do talk about play and playfulness and learning but that's actually a really strange tightrope to walk you know what I mean if you think about because I mean play is one thing but if you don't have a very specific kind of motivation play is just play and it's not really learning you know what I mean yeah there are elements of play and language learning and language teaching but I mean that's maybe the most rare and difficult to sustain of attitudes you know I mean well even for me with Chinese you don't see me playing a lot of games with Chinese you don't see me having a lot of fun learning Chinese and now advanced enough you know what I mean whether it's Chinese or lotion or crea I can sit and I can cut up some words on a little piece of paper and throw them on the floor and play some kind of game or something but it's it's tough and it's rare I mean Francis Bacon was mostly thinking about the sciences of trying to keep a playful yeah okay trying to keep it okay well you okay but you've just been doing that how successful are you with play and learning because I think like with your students I would say most of the time when it's play it's just play so I look for me I don't know but maybe I'm just the wrong person to speak on that but I think that's actually a really difficult it's kind of easy to plan that for for little kids even older as old as you know as young as like teenage age like how do you play so the four types of uncover your mission based learning fear motivated learning which may be really overlooked the role of authoritarian even if it's just the atmosphere of authority like being in a library in learning and then this kind of question for me opening question of play play based learning and so I've mentioned this to you recently back when I was studying Korean a jib way especially when we worked with some other languages too yeah when I work with poly and so I tried to get in touch with video game programmers and talked to several saying why can't we have software that allows people to at least practice these languages maybe not completely educational so far why can't we translate Pokemon into Kriya Ojibwe li you know what card based game so that at least the words are there and being practiced and so on can't we do something along these lines so I have taken an interest in play based language education and the role of play and at least practicing vocabulary and so on but it's and there is goddamn little out there there is very little even for a language like Japanese I really searched through all the software for a learning Japanese education I found nothing well film go next to nothing but Chinese says Chinese has a billion speakers and probably a hundred million people learning it because there's so many people in the West and even in other countries in Asia you know in Korea and so on and there is next to nothing so it is weird maybe that'll make a comeback but right now the role of play and learning obviously video games just one example he needs wooden blocks for all I care there all kinds of ways to incorporate play into learning it seems to be it seems to be really really waning right now really weak Chinese educational walks so my basic warning in this video it's funny motivation is perceived as this kind of meta virtue as what separates good students from bad students and even what separates good people from bad people you know why is he good person but because of how he's motivated you know like oh yes he has bad motives he has bad intentions we thinking about it in in this way but I think moto vation runs deep everyone knows that and I do think when you're talking about like what motivated me to learn the Lao language why did I make so much progress really in one year with leverage I got up to a level Lao was the only language I've learned where I couldn't make jokes that really made people laugh I would be able to spontaneously make original jokes and Lao people would really break a lot they really appreciated my sense of humor I'm not at that level in Chinese still to this day I don't think I've once told an original joke in Chinese that made people why not before once about very different very different time in my life and very different language I don't know I never I never made up in the original jokes and we bought strawberries once and you told them like that that I'm crazy it's not a problem for me it was a problem for you right you're right you're right right okay so that I made a joke with some strawberry vendors that that even though I'm stupid it's not really my problem it's their problem right yeah that that may be the only joke I made in Chinese that made people and they did laughs that's right we had a whole group of people and they laughed yeah I said yeah I'm stupid but but it's not my problem like I'm not embarrassed to admit you that I'm stupid you know you're the ones who have to figure out how many kilograms of strawberries I'm buying here not me so if I'm stupid it's your problem yeah okay great so thanks my girlfriend saved know that I made one joke one joke ever in Chinese that afterwards I explained to you what the why everyone was laughing right but look motivation runs deep it runs all the way deep and for me the the the extremely high levels of motivation I had whether I was cracking the books during that short period of time with Cambodian in that apartment or over long periods of time thing which is like palette lotion which I had no teacher in I had no teacher I had no help I had no encouragement I had no textbooks and to make my own textbooks for some of those languages being super highly motivated for some of these things also was linked to a tremendously deep soul destroying personal tragedy that many people can't relate to I mean that that is kind of the ongoing tragedy of my life as much as I've injured suffering under other headings with the death of my father being separated from my daughter which is incredibly harrowing like you say to people routinely look actually the real defining tragedy my life is higher education in Canada the university system and these things so yeah that's my judgment on that's my judgment on motivation as a highly motivated out of Didact for the most part when I talk to people about it I warned them against it because I'm I warned them about the real drawbacks the real extent to which your own personal sorrow and suffering is involved if you if you take this path all right