What motivates you?

[nereas]

I recently attended a business-related seminar where the speaker began with the question, "What motivates you?"

I gave them my own motivations, as follows:

1) air

2) warmth (blanket, etc)

3) sleep

4) water

5) food

6) job

7) scuba diving

The topic was headed in the direction of Maslow's pyramid, and I was primarily reconstructing the base of it, whereas others in the group had jumped onto the top of it right away.

The speaker asked me to explain "air."

So I told him that I was a scuba diver, and that therefore I think about air all the time (more specifically, nitrox or trimix), especially when I am underwater.

Maslow's pyramid is even more specific than that, at its base:

Maslow's hierarchy of needs - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The topic got me wondering about the huge role scuba plays in my life, from rethinking my priorities, to ways of effectively coping with risk and uncertainty, to planning my dives and my dive trips, including planning my years around exotic scuba destinations.

So, what motivates you? And what role does scuba play in all of it?

 

[Diver0001]

Maslow had 5 tiers, right? Here's mine starting from bottom to top:

1) health
2) happiness
3) connection (friendship)
4) love (deep friendship)
5) spirituality (unconditional love)

R..

 

[TSandM]

Looking at Maslow's tiers: I'm not terribly motivated by physiological needs, because they are so rarely not met, and I don't face the likelihood of privation in those areas. I AM motivated by the avoidance of pain; as I age, a lot of things hurt, and my behavior is shaped to avoid that.

Similarly with security. I live a pretty safe life. My behavior is rarely shaped by concerns about safety of my person, my property, or my future.

Although I am very loyal to my friends, seeking friendship isn't a big motivator, and I am not close to my family.

My keys are in the top two tiers. I'm driven by a need to achieve, to meet my own expectations, to solve problems and acquire skills. As I have said before, the best thing you can do to make something interesting to me is to make it difficult. And I absolutely love to learn. Diving reached me at this level.

 

[Mo2vation]

I've spent my whole life chasing this one.

I've spent the last 20 years of my professional career in the motivational, incentive and sales fields as a speaker, marketer, writer, consultant and business development professional.

Hence my handle for the last 20 years - Mo2vation.

Maslow was soft selling it.

Fear motivates me. In nearly every instance, in nearly every circumstance, in nearly every moment of life. Fear of not achieving my objectives, fear of not being the best I can be, fear of not getting other people to love me, fear of failure on many levels.

Oh, I'm quite the bucket of issues - but my energy is a gift and my desire to achieve lasting endeavors and pursue my objectives at a very high level drive me.

Diving lets me escape my fears. It requires 100% of my concentration and focus. It enables me to turn off the demons and requires me to fully concentrate on the tasks at hand. Only diving can do this for me - well, diving and drumming. They're the only times I am truly relaxed and at peace with myself. Both endeavors let me task load myself into a numbness that lets me escape me to an extent that can probably only be achieved otherwise through chemical means. So they're safer and better for me.

Diving matters a lot to me. It keeps me healthy.



---
Ken

 

[grazie42]

My prime motivator is experiencing "flow":
Flow (psychology - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

For me, when feeling "flow", it almost feels possible to taste the chemicals filling your bloodstream and you feel "alive" in a way that makes "everyday life" pale in comparison.

I find it easiest in activities that require total focus. For me it is quite easy to find such things like diving, skiing, kiting, cayaking, canyoning, climbing and a whole host of other physical activities...but I also find it in other places like during learning, negotiations, discussions, interactions with other people etc.

 

[nereas]

Looking at Maslow's tiers: I'm not terribly motivated by physiological needs, because they are so rarely not met, and I don't face the likelihood of privation in those areas. I AM motivated by the avoidance of pain; as I age, a lot of things hurt, and my behavior is shaped to avoid that.

Similarly with security. I live a pretty safe life. My behavior is rarely shaped by concerns about safety of my person, my property, or my future.

Although I am very loyal to my friends, seeking friendship isn't a big motivator, and I am not close to my family.

My keys are in the top two tiers. I'm driven by a need to achieve, to meet my own expectations, to solve problems and acquire skills. As I have said before, the best thing you can do to make something interesting to me is to make it difficult. And I absolutely love to learn. Diving reached me at this level.

TS&M, I am not surprised that you jumped completely to the top of the pyramid, just like virtually everyone else at the seminar, and also because you are a very successful person in your career.

I wonder though, doesn't scuba diving redirect your thinking back to the very bottom of the pyramid, to air and warmth, instead?

Or can you simply continue to take air & warmth for granted when you are underwater?

 

[nereas]

I've spent my whole life chasing this one.

I've spent the last 20 years of my professional career in the motivational, incentive and sales fields as a speaker, marketer, writer, consultant and business development professional.

Hence my handle for the last 20 years - Mo2vation.

Maslow was soft selling it.

Fear motivates me. In nearly every instance, in nearly every circumstance, in nearly every moment of life. Fear of not achieving my objectives, fear of not being the best I can be, fear of not getting other people to love me, fear of failure on many levels.

Oh, I'm quite the bucket of issues - but my energy is a gift and my desire to achieve lasting endeavors and pursue my objectives at a very high level drive me.

Diving lets me escape my fears. It requires 100% of my concentration and focus. It enables me to turn off the demons and requires me to fully concentrate on the tasks at hand. Only diving can do this for me - well, diving and drumming. They're the only times I am truly relaxed and at peace with myself. Both endeavors let me task load myself into a numbness that lets me escape me to an extent that can probably only be achieved otherwise through chemical means. So they're safer and better for me.

Diving matters a lot to me. It keeps me healthy.

---
Ken

Scuba lets me escape my stressors that await me on the dry land. It forces me to stop thinking about my job. Swordfighting helps me do that too, because when 90 centimetres of sharp steel is pointed at your face, you forget about everything else.

But scuba does it better, and I agree with you completely Ken about that.

So I left out the theraputic value of scuba, which you provided, thanks!

 

[nereas]

Maslow had 5 tiers, right? Here's mine starting from bottom to top:

1) health
2) happiness
3) connection (friendship)
4) love (deep friendship)
5) spirituality (unconditional love)

R..

I would have put "faith" after food and before job and scuba, in my list. I thought about it, but since the seminar and also Scubaboard are not church, I kept faith to myself. Thanks for pointing it out. There are probably billions of people on the Earth who consider faith as well, but it normally does not get spoken of in public outside of church a lot.

 

[TSandM]

TS&M, I wonder though, doesn't scuba diving redirect your thinking back to the very bottom of the pyramid, to air and warmth, though?

Or can you simply continue to take air & warmth for granted when you are underwater?

I'm not sure I'd say gas is a motivator. I arrange my dives so that gas is a parameter that's been considered and arranged ahead of time, and I dive within those limits. So I guess that, to a degree, my dive is altered by gas. But it's like I said about life in general -- I expect to have enough gas, because I set it up that way, so I don't think a whole lot about it.

Warmth, on the other hand, is a big motivator in diving for me. The past three years have been a continuous search for a way to stay warm in Puget Sound, and has involved a great deal of expenditure to that end. Neither gas nor deco limits my dives, in general; what drives me OUT of the water is cold. So I guess that IS a pretty powerful motivator!

 

[nereas]

I'm not sure I'd say gas is a motivator. I arrange my dives so that gas is a parameter that's been considered and arranged ahead of time, and I dive within those limits. So I guess that, to a degree, my dive is altered by gas. But it's like I said about life in general -- I expect to have enough gas, because I set it up that way, so I don't think a whole lot about it...

Even when I am diving with my twin 130s and others with me have smaller twins on, and therefore I exit the water after the dive with half my nitrox/trimix remaining, I still think about air during the dive.

And then on dry land, I think back to when I was underwater, and how important the air was to me then, and so I appreciate the air filling my lungs from the atmosphere on dry land as well.

I guess I cannot explain why it strikes me as so important, even on dry land.

One breath of bad air underwater can kill you.

But we never seem to appreciate that, either underwater or on dry land.