What's My Motivation...?

Peter Gibbons : "You see Bob, it's not that I'm lazy, it's that I just don't care."

Bob Porter : "Don't? Don't care?"

Peter Gibbons : "It's a problem of motivation, alright? Now if I work my ass off and Initech ships a few extra units, I don't see another dime, so where's the motivation? And here's another thing, I have eight different bosses right now."

Bob Porter : "Eight?"

Peter Gibbons : "Eight Bob. So that means when I make a mistake, I have eight different people coming by to tell me about it. That's my only real motivation is not to be hassled, that and the fear of losing my job. But you know, Bob, that will only make someone work just hard enough not to get fired."

- Office Space (1999)

I'm sitting in my RA office right now. What am I doing? I'm watching an episode of "Angel" on DVD and typing in this. What should I be doing? Maybe work, or even, heaven help me, my homework.

I have not done any actual homework for some time. What's more, I don't care. I will even bring my backpack in the office to work on something, like statistics. What happens? It sits there long enough to gather dust. I just can't bring myself to do it. I have no desire to do it.

I know this may not sound like a revelation for you, but for me, this is new. I have been a 4.0 student my whole college career...until last semester. This last Spring term, I got all "A"'s. My reward? A 3.7 GPA for the term. I was given "A-"'s.Ya, BYU has the wonderful pollicy of the +\- system. I had 109% in a class last year. Did I get an "A+"? No, they don't have that, only lower. How can that be fair? As a result, I don't have my 4.0 and can never bring it back up. So long for that motivation.

In these classes, I don't seem to be getting it at all. School has come somewhat easy for me. I did my work, and as I did it, I felt myself understanding it and felt good. Now I just do the monkey work and feel nothing. I take the test and feel nothing. If I study hard, I get the same grade as if I put in less effort. I don't have that 100% golden touch in my tests and quizes any more. I can't seem to break through that glass celing. Same grade for less effort, why bother?
Also, I don't seem to understand it any better either. Again, why bother?

How about work? Last night while working I got a call from the hale mom. She wanted me to walk around the Hale telling people to be quiet. I did. After about 10 minutes, I came back to the office to lock things up. As I am doing so, Mom comes around the corner in a huffy. "Jared! I thought I told you to walk around and tell people to be quiet! Why didn't you!?"

"I did. I just got back."

"No you didn't! How come they are still noisy if you did?!"

"Well, maybe they got loud again after I left?"

"No, you didn't go out! I just got back and had to tell them myself to keep it down! All you did is just sit in your office!"

"Mom, I'm telling you I did it!"

Then she just gave up and walked away from me in disgust and as she muttered something under her breath I yelled in anger, "Are you calling me a liar!?" just as she slamed the door shut. So much for catching more flies with honey...

So, why do I do what she wants if she won't belive me about doing it anyway? I am not feeling the motivation.

The worst part about not being motivated is that I don't care about that either. How can one motivate oneself to get motivated? What's my motivation for motivation?

Long story short: I don't care...and I don't care that I don't care. And that is what I do care about.