Міф про мотивацію. Як налаштуватися на перемогу

by Jeff Haden, Олександра Асташова (translator)

Мoтивaцiя — нe блиcкaвкa, якa paптoвo влучaє у вac cepeд дня. Кpiм тoгo, нaвpяд чи вoнa з’явитьcя пicля нaтxнeннoї пpoмoви, звopушливoгo фiльму чи зaпaльнoї пicнi — уce цe тимчacoвий пoштoвx, який уpeштi-peшт лишe poзчapує. Нacпpaвдi мoтивaцiя — цe peзультaт пpoцecу, a нe пepeдумoвa, cтвepджує Джeфф Гeйдeн. Ви, пeвнo, i caмi пoмiчaли, як виcнaжливe тpeнувaння poбить вac щacливими, a нeпpиємнi cпpaви, якi ви дoвгo вiдклaдaли, виявляютьcя лeгкими й нaвiть цiкaвими. Цe i є мoмeнт нaтxнeння.

У цiй книжцi aвтop нa влacниx пpиклaдax тa icтopiяx уcпiшниx людeй poзвiнчує мiфи пpo мoтивaцiю, у якi бaгaтo xтo впepтo вipить. A тaкoж пepeкoнує: дocить витpaчaти чac нa пoшуки нaтxнeння, пpocтo пopиньтe з гoлoвoю в poбoту — i мoтивaцiя вaм бiльшe нe знaдoбитьcя.

Genres: Nonfiction, Self Help, Productivity, Business, Psychology, Personal Development, Audiobook

192 pages, Hardcover

First published January 9, 2018

About the author

Inc. Magazine contributing editor, speaker, author of The Motivation Myth: How High Achievers Really Set Themselves Up to WIn.

Reviews

[Bianca · Rating 4 out of 5]

I downloaded this because it was available on the overdrive and it wasn't too long.

Unsurprisingly, it's written by an American. Is it just my impression or are most self-help books written by Americans? The only non-American self-help books I remember coming across were the Marie Kondo ones. Is it because Americans think they know it best, therefore, must share? Is it because of the constant strive for self-improvement, the you-can-be-anything-you-want-to-be mantra, which creates the demand? Or is my view skewed due to being on Goodreads? The thing is, the three advicey books I read so far this year were written by Americans. Sorry, going on a tangent, but I've been wondering...

Anyway, I didn't hate it. I think a lot of it had to do with the narrator of the audiobook, Ray Porter, who was excellent. Ok, and the occasional cussing, although I think it's starting to lose its "coolness", nevertheless, I still like it.

The Motivation Myth had some useful tidbits, hopefully, I'll remember some and stick to at least one, otherwise, I wasted my time, yet again. There weren't a lot of new ideas, but they were presented in a pragmatic, straight-forward way. As it's the case with most books in the genre, there was some repetition, but according to Haden, and science, repetition leads to improvement.

Read it/listen to it if you feel like it, or don't.

[Fate's Lady · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ableism warning!

I feel like I got a pretty decent handful of actionable takeaways and ideas from this book. It was also a delight, as always, to listen to Ray Porter reading. It lost a couple stars for not even trying to acknowledge that the advice is super ableist. A lot of it is useless or even harmful to people with disabilities of all kinds, but particularly for people with invisible disabilities, in my opinion. "Do x every day no excuses" is fine for people with typical bodies/health, but plenty of us out here are high achieving and successful despite severe limitations on our energy. Pushing through those limits can be tremendously damaging to our health, and it's taken me years to realize that "no excuses" advice like Haden gives here was actively remaking my health and well-being. There's absolutely zero mentions made or provisions given for people dealing with things like depression, chronic fatigue, severe insomnia, etc etc etc. Maybe he doesn't feel capable of addressing those concerns, but he should absolutely acknowledge them. He's doing a huge chunk of his potential readership a grave disservice otherwise.

[Emma Sea · Rating 2 out of 5]

Same old, same old. 'Success' is about the process. Set a goal, then forget about the goal. Focus on the day-to-day activities that will get you there. What matters is what you do today.

[Inna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Я нарешті починаю вчитися читати нонфікшн правильно. Як я це визначаю? Другу частину можна було і не читати, наскільки вона далека від нашої реальності, але перша відкрила для мене кілька цікавих ідей. І через це я вважаю її корисною: вона просто відповіла мені на кілька питань і надала можливість подумати про нові підходи. Все. Не витрачайте час на те, що для вас не корисно.

Зупинюся тут на двох цікавих для себе думках автора.
По-перше, він розказує про те, що велика мотивація рідко насправді рухає нас кудись через свою грандіозність і далекосяжність. Не часто таке нам кажуть, правда? Саме тому Джефф Гейден радить визначитися з тим, чого ви хочете, створити собі план, потім дрібніший план, поки ви не усвідомите свою щоденну планку, щоденний внесок у цю велику мету. Так от про мету треба забути, а пам’ятати саме про цей план, рутину повторюваних дій для того, щоб виробити навичку, спортивних вправ, які сьогодні навіть не обіцяють вам круту спортивну підготовку, або кількість написаних сторінок, щоб колись ваші тексти читали мільйони. Мотивація виникає в процесі і підживлюється нашими маленькими досягненнями. Якщо ця рутина приноситиме вам задоволення і ви будете слідувати плану, все вийде, якщо кожного дня будете думати про прірву між вами-сьогодні і вами-що-досяг-мети, то ця прірва вас демотивуватиме.

Ще одна цікава думка стосувалася гласності стосовно ваших планів. Пам’ятаєте пораду, якщо хочете виконати якусь роботу, досягнути певної цілі, то поділіться цим з близькими чи навіть у соцмережах? Мовляв, ваша обіцянка світу, наче строгий наглядач, штурханами рухатиме вас вперед? З вами це працює? Я просто приймала, що цей спосіб не мій і ніколи не задумувалася чому. Джефф Гейден радить не розказувати нікому про свої важливі плани, бо коли ви оголошуєте про них і отримуєте хвилю підтримки і побажань наснаги, ви психологічно сприймаєте це як момент досягнення цілі – звичний момент для овацій оточуючих. Після цього нас просто важко взятися виконувати те, за що вже нас похвалили і що вже високо оцінили наче зроблене. Саме тому чим довше я мовчу про роботу над певною ціллю, тим краще в мене виходить. Словом, не кажи «гоп».

[Heidi · Rating 2 out of 5]

The two stars are for the first two and a half chapters. Those were about motivation and seemed useful - they get stars. Then it turned into a general self-help, entrepreneurship type book that actually contradicted earlier points, has sexist asides and was just... blegh. Everything else gets 0 stars.

[Hel · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had decided to avoid reading personal development books, since all the authors seem to repeat the same sentences, using hundreds of examples in order to sell more pages.
However, I have to admit that the first chapters of this book were different and quite informing. It really helped me gain a realistic understanding of what motivation is, and what it is not.
But unfortunately, after a spot, it started becoming like my other -not so good- experiences. Dozens of tiring examples, as if the reader is a 5 year old kid with no prior understanding. Repeating the same old advices for success, insisting that you can not succeed if you don’t follow these steps. Even advices which had nothing to do in a book about “motivation” (E.g. practical guide for starting a business!!)
All in all, I suggest you to read “a mind for numbers” by Barbara Oakley, which is way much more scientific and useful. Or just borrow this book and read the first chapters if you’d like to save some time and money.

[Randi · Rating 2 out of 5]

I am a high achiever so I thought I would find this book informative and inspiring, but instead it just stressed me out.

[Donna · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked this one. It is nonfiction about achieving your little heart's desires. I liked the positive tone this had. It was very reader friendly and it had some great takeaways for wherever you are at in life. I also liked that it didn't feel overwhelming. There were also some great quotable quotes. I feel I need to re-listen to the audio so that I can write some of them down.

As I listened to this, I thought my son needed to hear this. So now I have to figure out how to spring this on him in a way that won't be a "mom lecture." 4 stars.

[Cara · Rating 5 out of 5]

It’s easy to get swept away by Big Dreams, and to brush off process as “the details.” Haden gives excellent advice for teaching yourself how to analyze your process, emphasizing that it’s consistent and concentrated efforts that achieve goals.

For those who already hard workers, the best advice may be the chapters (and sentences throughout) which emphasize that you can’t achieve dreams if you’re letting your process run you into financial, physical, or emotional ruin. While his enthusiasm can be very pedal to the metal in tone at times, each chapter contains reminders that a process which builds toward a goal as it tears down your well being is not a successful nor motivating process. As a productivity junkie, it’s tempting for me to look for the grind it out type of advice, but as I flip back through the book I’m trying to be conscious that, as Haden emphasizes, you can’t achieve anything if your process doesn’t take into account those pesky details like staying healthy and maintaining relationships.

[Jan Malinowski · Rating 5 out of 5]

If I were to describe this book with one word, I would say “honest”. Jeff very frankly talks about motivation, commitment, willpower and what it takes to be successful. He stresses that we are conditioned to say or do what is expected to be right. While most everyone says that family and friends are most important, many of us have other priorities. It doesn’t mean that we are bad. We are all different and we all have different goals. In first place we have to be honest with ourselves and decide on what we really want. Knowing what we want we should get in motion and start working on it. Real motivation doesn’t come from fire walks and talks. It comes from successes. That’s why on our way towards big goals we should set targets that are within our reach and focus on accomplishing them. If we want a perfect body we should focus on number of reps we do in a gym and not on our body weight. For whatever we wish to accomplish there is already a blueprint. There are many others who stepped the path. We should find out what they did. Pros can provide us with a priceless feedback. We have to go out of our comfort zone and reach out. Challenging ourselves is the only way to get better. It takes not only hard work and lots of sweat to be successful but also focus on what matters most. Sometimes to stay on track we have to be able to say no.
In short I read numerous books from the field and rarely someone says things as straight as Jeff. There is no empty talk. The book is confronting and is fun to read. Jeff is quite a personality; nascar pilot, photographer, ghostwriter, motivational speaker and certainly a sport fanatic. After reading I added pushups and squads to my morning routine...

[Michael · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’ll start by saying I did glean a few snippets of wisdom from this book (which is generally true from everything I read), but that did not make up for the overall lackluster content and sporadic nature of his writing.

The author is a ghost writer that primarily writes copy for magazines so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that it just felt like a string of ‘top 10’ lists and ‘get things done fast’ articles that didn’t really have much substance. There were a few references to studies done about behavioral science, but it just felt like he was summarizing other peoples work without synthesizing his own take or a unique perspective.

The author seems like he’s striving to better himself, which I admire, but his personal anecdotes were...dry, and the little jokes were unnecessary.

BUT the main reason I just can’t recommend this book is his dismissal of SMART goals. To start, in my option he incorrectly states that the ‘M’ stands for meaningful while it’s generally accepted and stated to be ‘measurable’.

Instead of trying to be contrarian and seem to break the mold by telling people to forget SMART goals he could have just incorporated the idea of ‘BSMART’ where B is ‘bold’ and should include the sense of inspiration he success he says can be attained by ‘forgetting your goals.’

He then proceeds to explain how it’s all about the daily process, the grind, putting rubber to the road (which I don’t disagree with) but he literally breaks his ‘process’ down into SMART goals. Specific: run three miles three times a week, eat <2500 calories a day. Measurable: do you have an pedometer or smart phone, do you have myfitnesspal to input food. attainable: yes, you aren’t trying to kill or starve yourself, relevant: yes, if you’re trying to run a marathon or lose 10 pounds. Time-bound: yes, he just reduces the time portion to ‘in every 24 hour period I will do....’

It’s a quick read so by all means give it a shot; at anyone want to free copy of ‘The Motivation Myth’ by Jeff Haden?

[Rosa Frei · Rating 5 out of 5]

The author Jeff Haden reveals in his newly published book 'The Motivation Myth: How Achiever Really Set Themselves Up to Win' on the basis of his own life experiences and plenty of interviews with high achievers, how to set and reach your goals. Some of my favorite statements from the book are:

- 'Motivation is really a result. Motivation is the fire that starts burning after you manually, painfully, coax it into existence, and it feeds on the satisfaction of seeing yourself make progress.'

- 'There is only one recipe for gaining motivation: success.'

- 'Specifically, the dopamine hits we get when we observe ourselves making progress. Not huge, life-changing successes. Those come all too infrequently, if ever.'

- 'If you want to stay motivated, if you want to stay on track, if you want to keep making progress toward the things you hope to achieve, the key is to enjoy small, seemingly minor successes—but on a regular basis.'

There are plenty of books about success published on a regular basis, this is one to recommend!

[Christine]

I may have to come back to this one. Not motivated enough to finish. Wink, wink!

[Roxanna · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's not often when I read a book that I constantly turn to the back cover and read what's being "advertised" as what the book is about. And if reading that blurb doesn't really say much, that's because the author's contrarian view that motivation is NOT your key to success IS the book. That's it - chapter 1, that's done.

To bulk this up to the size of a publishable book, Jeff gives you pretty much everything under the sun, including a step-by-step guide to starting a business, including what forms you have to fill and insisting that you open a business bank account so you can separate your business finances from your personal ones.

Jeff Haden writes primarily as a blogger (though he also disclosed that he's a ghostwriter in the book) and it shows, because the book is very much written as a "blog". The style is "I'll write about whatever I'd like to write about; who cares that you had come here to read something else". If this were a series of blogs, then one could just easily skip that blog and read the next with a more interesting headline; as a book, it's much harder to skip ahead especially when you don't know where he's going. Too bad as his punchy writing skill (suited to a motivational book) is really worthy of 5 stars and that was what kept me going to the end.

[Lloyd · Rating 1 out of 5]

Such a disappointing read. The whole premise of the book and what the author advertised about the book made it seem like an interesting read, sadly, it wasn't what was advertised to be.
Author haven't outgrown himself from being a columnist writer to a book writer. It was very frustrating read, author would quite often, mention that he would detail about something in the coming chapters ("Which I will talk about in the coming chapters"), it made it hard to for me to comprehend and make connections about what the author was talking about. He frequently contradicted himself on the things he talked about. There was no proper structure as to how to supply the content to the readers.
The author himself told in the beginning that he dislikes any horse-shit self-help book and this book wouldn't be one, but this book turned out to be one. I expected something about motivation and a philosophical approach to motivation. First chapter indeed was quite good compared to the rest fluff. After the first chapter it turned into the "horse-shit" advice and self-help content which was for the most part, very obvious. It wasn't even useful for the most part.

[Book.Teti · Rating 3 out of 5]

Przeczytana w e-booku, poradniki tego typu najlepiej mi się czyta na telefonie. Cieszę się, że wybrałam akurat ten tytuł podczas akcji CzytajPL, bo pomógł mi zrozumieć gdzie popełniam błąd szukając motywacji do zrobienia czegoś, albo do osiągnięcia celu. Autor naprawdę pokazuje nam zupełnie inną perspektywę i gdzie leży problem. Polecam jednak przeczytać tylko pierwszą połowę, która rzeczywiście dobrze obejmuje temat, ponieważ reszta to już bardziej lanie wody.

[Clara · Rating 2 out of 5]

The theory: motivation is hardly ever intrinsic but created by setting a goal, creating a process to reach it and then forgetting the goal, following the process and then being motivated by the process you made and don't want to ruin.

The rest of the book are just examples, some of them in regions where the author obviously has no expertise.

[Ryan Hawkins · Rating 3 out of 5]

Without a doubt, this was the most arrogant book I’ve ever listened to/read. It was also the most achievement idolizing book I’ve ever listened to/read. His god is achievement and personal success. It’s so obvious that this so, and it certainly is not a healthy example. He brushes aside any sort of sacrifice for others or loving relationships in the search of personal fulfillment and success (at the end he talks about relationships some, but he does so only to promote your own success and achievement and happiness). It was also very poorly written. All that being said, granted, I haven’t read many books in this category, so maybe I’m just not used to it. Possibly. But either way, it was shockingly haughty and self-absorbed. Sometimes I chuckled out loud because it was so much so.

Still, there was some insights to plunder. Here are some ideas I learned and will remember:

- He emphasized the difference between saying you ‘can’t’ do something vs. you ‘don’t.’ The latter is more powerful because it is an identity issue.
- He explained right away that choices are opposite of willpower; so, make less. Some examples of practical advice: eat the same breakfast, pick clothes in advance, do stuff in certain order, etc. He says decision fatigue requires willpower. The goal is to not have will power necessarily, since you will do much automatically or routinely.
- He explains why we shouldn’t multitask.
- He practically instructs to stop doing something right in the middle of something exciting, that way when you pick it up, it’ll flow right away and get you back into the flow.
- Concerning failure, he says that failure stinks but if you know you’ll fail on average a certain amount of times, it won’t phase you. It’ll just be about your rate of success return. It’s about numbers. So just keep at it.
- Concerning willpower, he says that people who get more done seem to have more willpower, but they do not. Instead, they have figured out ways to make decisions and do things without requiring the use of their willpower.
- Finally, he talked the advantage of making a wish list to clean up your to do list.

Would I recommend it? Not really. I only read it because I want to ‘make the best use of time,’ and humbly and lovingly be productive in this life, for God’s glory. This man wrote as a clear product of our culture, with self-achievement and success and personal fulfillment as the ultimate goal. It was a good paradigm of the idols in our society, but besides some gleanings, not worth the time.

[Tarun Sharma · Rating 2 out of 5]

Jeff Haden in his book "the motivation myth" explains about the process to follow to become a high achiever. Nearly 70 pages into the book and it has a monotonous tone to it. It's the same general things told over and over again. It has some not-so needed jokes which the book would've done without.

This doesn't take away the fact that it has some genuine life advices which will be helpful in taking decision and reaching your goals but also has some useless topics as fitness routines which totally deviates from the topic. It feels like Haden is trying to appeal to the general American audience who is interested in losing weight but personally, I did not find that topic remotely interesting in a business book.

You can give a shot to this book for a quick read. This book could easily be a 150 page book rather than a 260 pages. A lot of topics could've been removed to make it more precise.

[Rick Sabatini · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book! A little sassy, but has some great insights. Surprisingly quick read for almost 300 pages,
Must have big type.

Biggest takeaway is Haden’s approach to achieving goals.
Dream big, set the goal, create the plan, and then forget the goal and just focus 100% on running the plan.

I love it. It’s so easy to forget that execution is the main force that makes all dreams and goals succeed. This book may tell you things you already know, but they’ll tell you in a way you probably haven’t thought of before and may help create some connections in the mind that weren’t there before.

[Voltenion · Rating 1 out of 5]

Should have been an article. The first chapter is great, then the author wastes your time advising you on how to make friends and how to stop being fat(???), he even spends a good chunk telling you how to open a startup (with boring details that are only applicable to the US). Most of the book is only tangentially related to productivity and motivation.

[Cheryl Lim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Admittedly, like many other self-help books, a lot of the concepts mentioned in this book weren't entirely unfamiliar and the bulk of it appears to be based solely on his personal experiences. Regardless, Haden is very straightforward and honest in his writing and effectively dispels the myth of how society views motivation.

[Finka · Rating 2 out of 5]

Przeczytałam wywiad z autorem, bodajże w WO. Był naprawdę ciekawy i rzetelny, na tyle, że postanowiłam sprawić sobie książkę.
A dostałam neoliberalne kołczingowe pie*dolenie. Także tego, nie polecam.

[Martti · Rating 5 out of 5]

Needs a second read and probably on a paper copy to underline good ideas.

[Lesley Looper · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this audiobook and am taking away some good tips. I’ve listened to this while working from home during the COVID-19 pandemic, good timing for me.

[Liz · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love books like this. They always motivate me to go and do big things. He makes some really great points here too on how to keep motivation going.

[Grace]

As much as I appreciate this book for pointing out that the journey is more important than the goal, it’s nothing I haven’t heard before.

Listening to the first few chapters I found to be inspiring and to have some decent advice even though I’ve heard similar things before. But after that it became a little repetitive.

There were quite a lot of lists in this book with actionable steps which was nice. I’ll be implementing some of these into my life as structure is definitely something I’m lacking.

Overall, while I do think that it has some valuable pieces of information the book can pretty much be summed up by saying that discipline and making a process will get you to your end goal.

[Holli · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5
Actionable advice to incorporate. My favorite take away is that motivation does not cause success, but vice versa. Having success is motivational. That makes sense to me and setting yourself up for small successes will get you to big successes. I feel like this information is behind a lot of my successful work out programs, like Peloton or Whoop. Daily check offs are very satisfactory and motivating for me. “Don’t break the chain” has motivated me from a young age.

[bookolożka · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.3

[Isabelle Babson · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5/5⭐️