‘We were the masters of nature, the masters of the world. We had transcended everything—death, fatigue, our natural needs. We were stronger than cold and hunger, stronger than the guns and the desire to die, doomed and rootless, nothing but numbers, we were the only men on earth.’
Elie Wiesel ‘Night’
Night is one of those books most school programs make you read. Luckily it was never in of my school programs because I might have rebelled against it just for my hatred of school.
If you haven’t read ‘Night’ it’s Elie Wiesel recollection of surviving the Nazi death camps.
I had no interest in the Nazi death camps.
A friend gave me the book because she thought I’d like the way it was written.
She was right.
The moment I picked it up I couldn’t put it down even though I not only had no interest in the subject, the subject was pretty horrific.
It was a completely factual account of what people are capable of surviving.
And that is the third kind of effort.
Survival effort.
I meet a lot of young girls that are a lot like me when I was their age.
They alternate between creative effort, which are the things they are interested in and motivated by, and survival effort. The things they have no choice but to do to avoid total ruin.
The most interesting thing about survival effort is the things people associate with total ruin.
Part of the reason I was able to quit cigarettes is because I started to associate it with extreme danger.
In the 12 years I spent smoking cigarettes I knew the whole time that they were unhealthy for me and could cause cancer but it never deterred me.
I never even considered quitting until I got the proper motivation.
Which was the fact that I’d spent almost five years single and my brand new boyfriend told me he’d break up with me if I didn’t quit smoking.
It wasn’t the influence of just one man that made me consider quitting. It was the implication of smoking being so undesirable that men would count it as reasons not to be with me.
And even beyond that, I’d like to have children someday and I’m getting older.
Suddenly quitting smoking did feel dire. Like life and death.
The terror of failing to quit became about a hundred times stronger than the terror of the pain of quitting.
I’ve gotten really into Stargate.
At this very moment I would really like to watch Stargate.
I’ve just gotten off of a twelve hour shift at work without a break and dealing with a lot of people that were seriously offended that I didn’t have the energy to kiss their ass.
Watching Stargate before I go to bed sounds lovely.
Instead I’m writing this blog and I’m using willpower to do that.
Survival effort doesn’t use willpower.
Willpower is what I use as a cognitive override on my instincts or emotions.
But survival effort is the opposite. Instinct is taking over thought.
When things go so far south that there becomes only two options, do or die, our choice in matters seems to shut off. Survival always does, it never dies.
Once in a while I try to hack survival effort by letting my thoughts go dark. Letting my terror of a bad outcome take over.
It can be a very powerful motivation.
But it’s a bad strategy.
I think it’s especially bad for most women to let ourselves feel too stressed.
This might be an unpopular opinion but it is just an opinion.
I think men are better equipped to handle survival effort. And maybe it’s part of the reason they can feel so comforting and stabilizing to be around.
Right now I do everything I can to stay away from using survival effort.
I try not to motivate myself with fear or worry.
I try to motivate myself from an inspired place or a disciplined place.
Which means I try to stay much more organized and productive with small things and try not to allow them to become big things.
It also means I stay away from setting too long term or too high of goals.
All my goals are very short term and light.
For example instead of ‘get a boyfriend’ my goal is, ‘smile and flirt with a man I think is hot’
Or with this blog, rather than having the goal of ‘becoming a writer’ I just have. ‘Finish 30 day streak on blog’ it keeps the mind out of the gutter so my thoughts can’t get too dark and I don’t fall into survival effort.
I can stay in discipline and creativity.
This streak day 29 by the way.
Jess lanai 