What Motivates Us
What is it that motivates us? What keeps us going? Am I still trying to impress my mom, years after her dementia has eliminated any hope of resolution? Have I assigned others to that role? Is it Jesus I am trying to impress? I have always looked forward to that perfect firm handshake. A vision of Jesus recognizing me, has been expecting me, says it was a job well done, I was in the top one percent of all time, here is your special certificate, you are a good and faithful servant, welcome home, we have a satisfying job for you, filled with many people you will remember and others that you have been wanting to meet, you’ll always be busy and necessary, yet well-rested.
Yes, that's much of it. My eyes blur and fill thinking of it.
And I do have a running internal dialogue with many people past, present and historical. Whenever I read something, see something, do something, feel something, there is always a person that I am sharing it with. My mom has never really been in that dialogue, at least consciously. But she’s always there, deep under the rest, forever unimpressed.
When I write. When I see a patient. When I hear a song. When I read a news article. When I dream. When I am quiet. There is always someone there with me. Someone I share it with. A gentle longing. One in which I skim atop, rarely diving too deep.
I keep boxes filled with letters and photographs and memories. I’ll never open them, yet never dispose of them. I move them from home to home. The present is safer. The past is not helpful except as context.
And it’s not the lack of work that scares me about retirement. About becoming sick or disabled or unable to see patients. It’s the lack of meaning. The lack of doing something that feels worthy of sharing with my cloud of witnesses. It’s meaning that motivates.
And work isn’t a pathology. It’s what gets me up in the morning. It’s what gives me a reason to focus on sleep. On diet. On exercise. On the calendar. Work frames my day. On a Friday afternoon, when I don’t think I can meet one more patient, I open the door anyway, and give the next person my best.
Something is there for all of us, motivating and pushing us. It’s not necessary to name it. Although community is surely in the name somewhere. But it is certainly important to nurture it. One life. One moment at a time. This morning. This week. This winter. This beautiful new year. The present informed by the past, but not lost in it. Grateful for those that choose to travel with us. And grateful for those that once did.
Holy One, help us to continue to find meaning and motivation. And to hold space with others as they do the same. Amen
Brandon is a member of Peace Church and interested in slowing down time. Especially Saturday mornings.