Intrinsic Motivation
People are generally so afraid to try new things or take on worthy challenges because they are afraid of failure. They think that failure results in the end of the world. But the truth is that in order to achieve anything worthwhile, we have to fail sometimes in order to learn. If we get the intrinsic motivation to help us accept our failures as simply the learning opportunities to do better, we will become more successful in the end.
I shot a recent episode of Motivational WebTV where I showed my viewers my first ever vegetable garden as an example of proving that it’s never too late to learn new skills. The video showed the garden at full bloom as I was able to harvest lettuce and beans. However, I really didn’t get into the failures that came along the way to that stage but they were perhaps necessary in order for me to learn how to do things better with the garden to produce a decent crop.
Intrinsic Motivation At Work After Flooding
Here is where the intrinsic motivation was at work. I already knew that any failures with my garden would simply be learning experiences. In the first few weeks as the little plants were starting to show, there were a few heavy rain storms. Some of my planters got flooded and wiped out the plants.
Now I knew better to protect them from heavy rain and also make sure there was enough drainage on the bottom with holes. I also resoiled and replanted the affected planters with new seeds.
Intrinsic Motivation After Too Much Heat
There were also days when there was too much strong sunshine and heat. This also dried up some of the plants too leaving them beyond recovery. So instead of giving up, I again had intrinsic motivation to accept this loss and learn from it.
So I researched a bit more into the plants, especially the lettuce since they seemed to be more vulnerable to intense heat than the beans or carrots I planted. I learned that I should keep the lettuce in the shade if the days get too hot. So from then on, at about noon, I transfer the lettuce planters to a shaded area in my outdoor deck until evening.
Intrinsic Motivation After Weeds
Another learning opportunity came when there were these odd plants that grew really well. I didn’t know what they were. I planted only four different types of seeds and there were definitely more than four different types of plants growing in my vegetable garden.
One of these unidentified plants grew as high as 1.5 feet tall and was like a mini Christmas tree. Then one of my friends suggested that it was probably a weed. At first, I didn’t understand this but then I was told that sometimes there are weed seed in the soil that I buy.
So I ripped out all of the plants that looked like weeds to me. I already knew by then which were the vegetables I planted. I was quite surprised about the extensive roots system that some of these weeds had. No wonder why they seemed to be sucking all of the nutrients in the soil leaving my vegetables struggling for survival.
Once more, it’s the intrinsic motivation that kept me on the right track despite the invasion of the weeds. And soon after I ripped the weeds out, my vegetables, particularly the lettuce that was struggling, started to grow out really well.
The end result of learning from all of these initial failures I experienced in my first vegetable gardening attempt was what you see in the Motivational WebTV video, which I’m not quite proud of (and enjoying fresh salads from my vegetable garden as well).
My Snow Skiing Failure That Ended Up With Success
I have other personal examples of failures as well but thanks to intrinsic motivation, I was able to accept them, learn and continue towards success. One of these examples I’m most proud of was my snow skiing experience documented in another past episode of Motivational WebTV – see it at Motivation In Climbing To Success.
