The thing about salience is that it's not about what is actually important, it's about what feels important.
A loss or absence of motivation is more about the fact that what is actually important is not aligned with what currently feels important.
Intellectually we can believe that the thing we are not motivated to do is more important than whatever task we have taken up in its stead (scrolling, media, games etc.) But it's not emotionally cohesive.
The emotional imperative to just look at one more video or whatever is stronger than the perceived more difficult task that is being avoided.
That is because the distractions are more emotionally compelling, they feel more emotionally safe to experience the full range of emotions and the task being avoided feels more risky.
It may involve difficult emotions that we may not know how to process such as being afraid to fail, self doubt, low self opinion, overwhelm, lack of hope or belief in one's own self efficacy.
That is why a lot of advice to try harder and be more focused is often ineffective. The problem isn't a lack of trying or a lack of focus (because it easy to focus on distractions).
Amotivation is a lack of processing difficult emotions, it is"numbing out" your feelings or struggling to perceive and therefore process feelings.
It is the failure to perceive a task that needs doing and have the corresponding emotional nudge of "hey this needs doing okay cool I will do the thing".
It is not looking forward to the results of the things that you do because they are outweighed by the anxiety of failure or other difficult feelings.
I am a person who has experienced some difficult and emotionally traumatic things that made me want to nope out of processing and accepting the things that have happened in order to survive.
I realised that conventional treatments for my poor mental health were not as effective as they should have been because depression and anxiety were not at the root cause for why I have been struggling.
This is not my way of saying that mental health treatments or diagnosis is completely unhelpful. I have learned lots of useful things in my years long endeavour to find a way to live.
I think particularly with the NHS, treatment only goes as far as getting back to work/serving the economy and improving a person's quality of life and alleviating suffering is secondary.
Kind of like, there's a certain amount of pain and suffering that is tolerated or tolerable and a mental illness is only really considered an illness when the behaviours of the person suffering disrupt the economy by either not working or not engaging in social reproduction. I digress.
I spent about 15 years working on trying to address my traumatic experiences.
I had a long-term relationship during the first 5 years and when that ended I realised that my mental health was interfering with my ability to have a healthy relationship. Being in a partnership wasn't necessarily helping and in some ways it was making things worse for myself. I decided to turn away from dating and romance until I could address my issues for myself.
I have worked off and on with 7 different counsellors and 1 CBT practitioner, tried 3 different antidepressants, tried working out 3 times a week, made more friends, moved, travelled, did freelance work, volunteered, got new hobbies, joined an art collective, protested, gained qualifications, read at least 1 self help book (it was bad), went to a mindfulness class that was actually a Buddhist meetup where they tried to pressure me into signing up for a retreat that I didn't want to go to, I tried gong baths and sound therapy. I got a frigging art degree which is probably the most expensive kind of torture therapy there is.
I have tried so many things and the last two years of being very underemployed might have been difficult but it has allowed me to stop and just reckon with my trauma, stop distracting myself with all of the other aspects of living.
Yes I have been angry and frustrated with myself, furious really. But I have made practical steps to address it and for the first time ever I am starting to think I might be okay and that there could be a future for me.
Materially I have never been worse off. I'm going to be 35 and living with my parents broke. But I know what's wrong with me, and the methods I have been using to try and fix myself have been working. I have been blessed to have had this time.
Yesterday I went to the churchyard in a town I used to live in and sat in the cool summer shade and cried. I laughed a bit too. I probably looked kinda insane but graveyards are a socially appropriate place to grieve, even if it's not the dead that I was mourning at that time.
I have just been through so much and it's hard to explain myself. I am moving on. It feels like this chapter of my life is coming to a close and I am ready for the next part. I can figure out what kind of person I want to be. I'll figure out where I want to go. I shall carry my younger traumatised self with me, but that is not what is going to define my life anymore.
Ironically stuck in my head:
Mazeretim Var Asabiyim Ben by MFÖ
Reading: While You Were Seething by Charlotte Stein
