Proper Motivation

I enjoy writing, as this blog may or may not have demonstrated. However, I am taking a short break from writing, and am taking an even short break from that break to write this.

For about two weeks before Halloween, I was working on writing this short story that I had thought up months back but had never really put that much effort into writing. At about two weeks before Halloween, I gave myself the challenge of having the story written up and ready to post to DeviantART. I did manage to do it, though those fourteen days were spent in varying states of frenzied writing, and I was doing finishing work on Halloween itself. Still, I got it finished and up on Halloween, which is what I intended, even if it was with less than three hours left in the day, which was not intended. At 27 pages and over 11,000 words, that story (it was a novelette, not a short story, technically) was a severe challenge to get through, and so I'm taking a short break (about a week or so) from writing before working on the follow-up story. I don't think I'll be doing the short notice deadline thing to myself again, as the follow-up is much less planned-out.

At about the same time (and still going on), a gaming website that I am a member of was (and is) celebrating the tenth birthday of the site. To that end, several events were planned, some have already taken place, some will take place, and some are currently taking place. One event in the third category is a contest of gaming skill. The qualifier round required participants to show that they have collected an infrequently-awarded badge (a small picture signifying competency and skill at a specific game). I already had several, but (not sure what was to come next) I decided to collect several more (boosting my chances, should it prove necessary - if we need more, I'll have more). I ended up revisiting two games that I played some time ago but didn't look at since. One of the badges I collected wasn't overly challenging; I was able to get it in two days. The other took longer and did prove more of a challenge, but in the end, I was triumphant.

It occurs to me, as I look back on these events, how motivation can influence a person's actions. With the right motivation, someone may be willing to try something they would normally dismiss, or put forward greater effort into something they were already doing. And then, when we are doing that thing, we may just find that it wasn't as difficult as originally thought.

How many opportunities have been passed by because it seemed too hard? How would life have differed if those paths had been pursued?