There is the perception of hope - Incentive.
There is the perception of progress toward that hope - Joy.
And there is the perception of progress toward a never ending, unconfined hope to accomplish anything - Power.
YES!
That really is the MOST relevant question that you will ever ask for the rest of your life.
And of course, one that I have not ignored.
The ability to cause ones inner self (feelings) to agree with one’s cognitive decisions is called “Discipline” or “being a disciple”. How does one become a disciple to the true form and substance of his own life?
Governments ask the same question, “How can we get our own people behind our agenda?”
Or in the military, the General asks, “How can I get my troops to obey my plans and commands?”
And the answer can be stated simply, but doing it is another matter.
One must attend to “Impedance matching” - “grasping only that which is within reach”.
Buddhist monks practice that for their entire lives. And they accomplish Tae Chi, or “Self-Harmony”.
But the more relevant concern is how to do it right such that everyone isn’t merely contemplating their navel for the rest of their lives.
The typical Westerner does the opposite, getting completely involved in tempting, uncoordinated distractions from what his life actually is, the combination of those three efforts.
As each of those efforts increase, they each enhance the ability to increase the others more greatly. They are a self-sustaining, self-maintaining, self-valuing group of efforts, called a living being, a “living particle”.
How any one person accomplishes this in the “right way” (the most beneficial to that person) depends upon the condition in which they begin. The Western world is at war with itself using mental, medical, and military means to ensure each governor gains his own agenda by ensuring that none “beneath him” gain’s theirs. That puts everyone in a pickle.
I have been trying to emphasis the importance of you attending to those specific efforts for what, 3 years or so? Online is a very, very slow means to communicate to another’s feelings. What takes 6 months online, I can do (and have done) in merely 3 days in person. Most such efforts are not worth the effort (which is why so very many people merely leave the internet for the kids).
But it all begins, as has been told for thousands of years, by divorcing one’s self from the “world” and focusing on a new path. But that alone requires discipline that is usually not discipline as much as depression and/or disgust or anger (a cheating way to get the emotions to do what they needed to do. How do you get your nation to attack Iraq? - Anger them). One must stop getting distracted by enticing signs of hopes and threats that keep them from attending to their real need. Since governors won’t stop using them, one must stop being exposed to them such as to prevent the belief in the hopes and threats offered by them. One must turn away from those tempting distractions from anything other than those 3 concerns of life.
Or as Moses put it, “Do not consume the meat of a bifurcated-hoofed animal.”
One means to head in that direction is to resolve the Stopped Clock Paradox.