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Description
This is how you unlock permanent and consistent motivation with the DFUZ method.
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= About Dr Justin Sung = Dr. Justin Sung is a world-renowned expert in self-regulated learning, certified teacher, research author, and former medical doctor. He has guest lectured on learning skills at Monash University for Master’s and PhD students in Education and Medicine. Over the past decade, he has empowered tens of thousands of learners worldwide to dramatically improve their academic performance, learning efficiency, and motivation.
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My Notes
0:00 Intro
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00:00: Four step method called DFUZ (diffuse) to stay motivated, especially when I feel tired, lazy or burnt out
1:10 Theory behind motivation
- 01:05: There are two ways to use motivation
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- healthy and productive
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- Counterproductive and leads to burn out.
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- 01:27: Say you have a goal
- In order to accomplish it, you need to want to accomplish it, (intention)
- Then you need to take a series of actions
- But unfortunately we get distracted, lazy, tired
- ⭐ 02:28: motivation allows us to overcome distraction, lazyness and fatigue
- 02:49 ⭐: MOTIVATION-DEPENDENT: This is the first way that people use motivation (to overcome distraction etc.) and that is a major problem.
- 03:32: Sources of motivation
- Extrinsic motivations: money, reward, social status
- intrinsic motivations: things that come from our own mind. e.g. satisfaction, fulfillment, sense of purpose, enjoyment.
My personality seems to find it difficult to find intrinsic motivators
Over the years, I’ve learned that for some reason I find it difficult to find intrinsic motivators. I tend to be skeptical of anything that claims to be inherent, intrinsic or fundamental, and I tend to try to break them down and expose them as arbitrary. In other words, I have a tendency to overthink things. This is a trait of mine that might be beneficial in some ways, but I’m learning can be challenging in the area of motivation because it become harder for me to find lasting motivation.
4:15 The problem with being MOTIVATION-DEPENDENT
- 04:08: The problem with MOTIVATION-DEPENDENT and why DFUZ is better:
- Observation: Extrinsic motivators are fluctuating and out of our control so if we derive motivation from extrinsic sources then this will fluctuate our motivation as well.
- 04:47: Observation: Intrinsic motivations tend to be more stable.
- But even intrinsic motivators tend to fluctuate. e.g. our sleep levels, mood etc.
- This means our motivation will always fluctuate.
- 05:13 ⭐: So if your productivity depends on your motivation level then your productivity will always fluctuate.
The better alternative: being MOTIVATION-ENHANCED
- 06:20: Motivation-enhanced. This is what the DFUZ method is based on.
- ⭐: Being motivation-enhanced means you can be motivated, but you don’t need to be motivated.
-
I keep motivation in the reserves for the days that i really need to use it.
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- ⭐: Being motivation-enhanced means you can be motivated, but you don’t need to be motivated.
7:17 Step 1: D: Distinguish
- 07:15: Recognize the difference between feelings, thoughts, and actions.
- Feelings:
- e.g. hunger is a physical feeling.
- Thought: “I must eat”
- Action: I start eating
- Feelings:
- These are chained together, but they don’t have to be.
- I feel hungry but that doesn’t mean that I must eat.
- thought action fusion: The state where we assume that we must follow a particular thought with a particular action
- thought action defusion: The decoupling of though and action whereby we recognize that we can meet that thought with that action, or we could use some other action
- Distinguish between a feeling a thought.
11:04 Step 2: F: Fake it til you make it
- 10:59: fake it til you make it.
- Observe: An actor might feel tired when they come to work, but they can act as another character who is not tired.
- In the same way, we can fake or pretend to be someone who is not tired or lazy.
- ⭐: We don’t have to change the way that we feel. We can simply pretend to feel the way that we must.
- The nice side effect is that when you fake it, it actually makes it easier to do it, and to be genuine doing it.
- ⭐: Thoughts lead to actions, but actions can also lead to thoughts which makes a positive cycle.
- This enables us to act without feeling like acting
- 13:19: But this de-fusion state can only be held for a limited time. We need a way to maintain this longer-term.
13:52 Step 3: U: Uptime: Increase resilience
- 13:48: Aim to gradually increase the uptime of our thought-action defusion while continuing to take action.
- MY THOUGHTS: I think that others would call this resilience or grit.
- 14:14: Neural plasticity: Our brain will adapt over time and get better at this skill.
- 14:40: Objection: This seems like you’re training us to become mindless robots
- Observation: Notice that many of our tasks in modern life aren’t very natural anyways.
- We need modern solutions to modern problems.
- Observation: Notice that many of our tasks in modern life aren’t very natural anyways.
15:58 Step 4: Z: Zone
- 15:55: To maintain consistency and reduce our need for motivation, we have to create a zone of focus, free from distraction and procrastination triggers.
- 16:11: Exercise: The distraction cheat sheet.
- Each time you get distracted, write down what got you distracted.
- Later, remove each distraction from your area.
- 16:11: Exercise: The distraction cheat sheet.