Who or what motivates you in your life?

1. The nurturing of others and caring for their needs is important to me.

2. Anger is a natural part of life nowadays. Everyone gets angry and it’s a good way to get heard and let off steam.

3. I think competition is lacking in the 21st Century. Humans need to aggressively compete. It’s part of their nature.

4. I have started to find joy in the simplest of things recently.

5. I feel a trademark of success is an ability to outmaneuver or overpower anyone that is weaker that you are.

6. You need a lot of money and quality possessions to be happy nowadays. I think that without money your life has no value.

7. I’m sometimes aware of an inner vacuum inside me and it’s hard to fill.

8. I would value my friends more than my family every time.

9. As I become a little bit older, I have found myself searching for more on a spiritual level. There must be more to life.

10. I am motivated by money and the drive to improve my lifestyle.

11. I’d like to give money to worthy causes but I don’t have enough money to spare once I’ve paid for everything that I want.

12. I want to seek out my life purpose because I know that it will bring me peace.

13. I am altruistic and have a real need to give my time to others.

14. Humans are motivated by things they are emotionally attached to - if I can’t feel it, I can’t be motivated by it.

How did you respond? Did any of your answers surprise you? What did you learn about yourself from this short exercise? Is there anything that you might change in your life as a result?

At Life4seekers we don’t ever judge people. We believe that people are good and deep down desire things and someone greater than themselves. Even though you may not be able to name this ‘someone’ or ‘something’ the Truth is that it / He is God who made Heaven and Earth. He has a very special plan for you and your life.

Jesus Christ, as Son of God, taught that the path to fulfillment and inner freedom involves being concerned with our inner motivations and preoccupations. He taught that even if we think of doing something selfish or bad this needs to be addressed. Bad thoughts, can lead to bad actions and so we need to pray for the grace to think and do good in every situation.

In turn this will lead to good actions. It’s hard to explain, but perhaps this might help:

‘Jesus said, “You will be able to tell them by their fruits. Can people pick grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles? In the same way, a sound tree produces good fruit but a rotten tree bad fruit. A sound tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor a rotten tree bear good fruit. Any tree that does not produce good fruit is cut down and thrown on the fire. I repeat, you will be able to tell them by their fruits."
Matthew’s Gospel, chapter 7, verses 16 - 20