The ultimate form of intrinsic motivation is when a habit becomes part of your identity. It’s one thing to say I’m the type of person who wants this. It’s something very different to say I’m the type of person who is this.

Researchers concluded that the expectation of a reward snuffed out their enjoyment of drawing. Overall, Pink said, extrinsic motivation – the promise of money or perks – often promotes short-term thinking, ruins the enjoyment of the activity, encourages short cuts and cheating, crushes creativity and diminishes performance.

Once employees base their motivation on extrinsic factors they are much less likely to take chances, question established policies and practices, or explore the territory that lies beyond the company vision as defined by management.

Prestige is an ok motivator, but curiosity is a better one. Curiosity never lies.

Scientists who study human motivation have lately learned that after basic survival needs have been met, the combination of autonomy (the desire to direct your own life), mastery (the desire to learn, explore, and be creative), and purpose (the desire to matter, to contribute to the world) are our most powerful intrinsic drivers — the three things that motivate us most. All three are deeply woven through the fabric of flow.

I think the basic motivation for my research and publishing papers in the conventional media is curiosity.

Autonomy is the desire to steer our own ship. Mastery is the desire to steer it well. And purpose is the need for the journey to mean something. These three intrinsic rewards are the very motivators that motivate us most. In

The person who is motivated by necessity is interested in what’s known and what’s secure. The person who is motivated by possibility is equally interested in what’s not known. He wants to know what can evolve, what opportunities might develop.

I am not really motivated by confidence. Nor by curiosity. What I would say is, it’s more anxiety. I spend much more time being anxious than being confident or being curious. My mind sort of constantly worries. It’s not confidence — okay, I have of course some self-confidence, but it’s not a kind of overreaching confidence, by no means. I knew only one person who had overreaching confidence, that was Michael Atiyah. I really liked him a lot. He could jump to other topics. But I am not like him. I am much more motivated by the fact that when I do not understand something, it makes me suffer. It puts me into a state of misery. I am feeling bad until I understand. That’s exactly the motivating force.

the natural sciences intrigued and fascinated me through the efforts of my teachers. I had the inner motivation to learn, and I was inquisitive.

Harmonious passion is related to having high levels of grit, whereas obsessive passion is not.23 If you’re obsessively passionate, you’re thinking short-term. You’re trying to force things to go your way. But you don’t truly want whatever it is you’re seeking. You just think you need it because you’re unresolved internally. Whether you get what you want or not, sooner or later you’ll shift that unhealthy need onto something else — the hedonic treadmill will continue. Similar to harmonious passion, intrinsic motivation is also related to having high levels of grit, whereas extrinsic motivation is not.24

When you feel perpetually unmotivated, you start questioning your existence in an unhealthy way; everything becomes a pseudo intellectual question you have no interest in responding whatsoever. This whole process becomes your very skin and it does not merely affect you; it actually defines you. So, you see yourself as a shadowy figure unworthy of developing interest, unworthy of wondering about the world - profoundly unworthy in every sense and deeply absent in your very presence.

I am strong-willed, and I am driven, and I am passionate...but I don’t have…a central cause…a motivating cause, I don’t know what that would be…other than trying to tell the truth when I work.

[M]otivation... does not arise from intelligence itself, but from a motivational system underlying all directed behavior. ...[T]here is no reason that could let us take behavioral tendencies such as self-preservation, energy conservation, altruistic behavior for granted—they... have... to be designed [including by evolutionary methods] into the system...