The human body always fights to maintain homoeostasis. This is a scientific term which means “stays the same”. For example when your body temperature rises, your veins vasodilate (widen) to allow heat to leave the body. This is an attempt to bring the body back to it’s preferred temperature. To stay the same.

The human psyche is the same. Your brain often seems to fight hard to maintain the current lifestyle to which you have become accustomed. In one way this is good, as it means you will fight tooth and nail to stop yourself sliding down life’s ladder. On the flip side of this, it also means that something deep inside of you will fight your attempts to make your life better. This seems counter-intuitive, but it actually makes good evolutionary sense. The logic is that if you are surviving with your current lifestyle, then why risk jeopardising it by making changes. It is in this way that our DNA often drives us to remain mediocre.

This is a problem that plagues me. I live in a first world country, in one of the most vibrant cities in the world, where I have an income that is around 50% above the mean. Last year I fucked over 20 girls, some of which were really quite attractive. Most of my needs within Maslow’s hierarchy are met with ease. And there in lies the rub. My lifestyle is mediocre by many western standards, and yet it’s comfortable enough that my subconscious will fight any changes that may put it in jeopardy.

My lifestyle feels quite mediocre to me. I even feel a little trapped in my chosen career. I yearn to join the ranks of the top few percent of men, who earn at least a few times the average income, fuck hot women, and enjoy a high degree of freedom in terms of where they go in the world and when.

The only way out is to trick my brain. Most people, myself included can be very apathetic when it comes to being motivated by success. What I do have going for me, like most people, is a very healthy, and motivating, fear of failure. So that’s the trick. I have to make my brain believe that by not doing the things I need to do to make it into that top few percent. I spend a lot of time mind fucking myself. I have to make myself believe my life is a pathetic failure, a mess. Here are some of the things I often dwell on to the point of unhappiness and fear in order to motivate myself:

• I’ve cut off all internet dating, and I no longer hit on girls less attractive than the top quality of girls I’ve fucked in the past. It’s my previous best or better. The result of this is that I’m not regularly getting laid at the moment. I’m going on dates with attractive girls, and unable to benefit from being better looking than them, I’m getting rejected. This makes me feel bad. It was just today that the sense of fear of losing my ability to get laid really bubbled up to the surface. This is driving me on to study up on game. To right After Action Reports to analyse what’s going on in an attempt to get better.
• I let every little thing I don’t like about my job expand in my mind until it makes me feel a searing rage at having to work in an office for other people. Day after my brain is slowly internalizing the fact I’d be better off working for myself, and it’s pushing me to do what’s needed to get there.
• Every day I imagine one of two possible futures for my chosen career. Either going into management, seeing my earnings rise but hating every day of having to be an office bound people pleaser. The other option is staying purely technical but no longer being able to get hired in 5 years time, and seeing my salary stagnate. As with above this drives me towards my own business.
• I imagine what life will be like when I’m older if I’m not wealthy. I’m not planning to get married, so at the moment my future would be just me in a shitty little studio apartment in the UK not getting laid as I’m past it. This drives me to want to move abroad, make a ton of cash, and regularly fuck hot hookers when I’m too old to pull.

If you’re having difficulty achieving what you want it may well be lack of motivation. Just remember that fear and unhappiness will motivate you more than the joy of having your wildest dreams come true.