Change your motivation to boost your mental potential

The author

The biological brain gives rise to the physical mind. The basis of mental regulation occurs through interaction with the environment, which leads to energy and information exchange. Interaction triggers energy imbalances, so-called emotions, which trigger actions that recover the neutral state. Thus, the environment regulates animal behavior (such as mammals and birds) by triggering appropriate emotions, which produces actions that extinguish those emotions. Emotions integrate the brain (and the organism) seamlessly into its environment. 

Orienting in time, the mind interprets stimulus as a binary code, either past or the future. The emotional history forms the mind's temporal landscape. The new is based on the promises and possibilities in unsecured, unknown situations, which can even be threatening. But they can also come with opportunities, such as food or find a mate. The past corresponds to the need for safety and security, which can lead to boredom. Therefore, both the future and the past can trigger both positive and negative emotions. From mice to whales and humans, mental regulation is based on these basic orientations—positive or negative attitude.

Negative emotions are the tools of destruction, whereas positive feelings are the success generators of the mind. However, even positive feelings can produce emptiness and superficiality, which mitigates failure. Inversely, negative emotions can be turned around, producing mental brilliance and success. This complexity gives rise to perplexing real-life examples: promising young talents ending as a miserable failure and inauspicious beginnings leading to spectacular success. This way, the individual creates his own history. 

Therefore, attitude via positive or negative emotions is a fundamental personal success component. Goal orientation is an imaginary mental compass that moves toward the future by automatically supplying an appropriate attitude in any situation. Even rats remember location clues better when working toward a goal. In human subjects, the motivation to obtain rewards reduces conflict-related activation, thereby enhancing performance. In computer simulation studies, a goal-oriented effort was a superior success method (Wissner-Gross and Freer, 2013). Working through adverse circumstances produces confidence, the mental capital for resolve, and motivation toward success. Inversely, belief permits goal-oriented work. 

A more detailed explanation for some of these and other questions about the mind can be found in the book, The Science of Consciousness. 




Copyright © 2017 by Eva Deli