Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us

Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us
by Daniel Pink


What motivates us? Really?


In reading this book, I'm struck by how damn good at conforming I -am- was. As a kid, I quickly grasped the whole - it doesn't matter if it makes sense, just that you do what the teacher/parent/coach/etc wants when they ask. I was super good at school and giving the ‘right' answer even when it was ‘not-exactly-right'. I went on to try to get my kids to follow the whole do A to get B formula. All of this is exactly in line with the thinking BEFORE I was born, entrenched in the systems of adults to this day. Except, in some places. That thinking was that people are like “smaller, slower horses, responding to juicy carrots and painful sticks” (paraphrasing). Thinking this way leads teachers to ply students with good reader awards after x hours of reading, managers to give cash bonuses if you meet the target, and all kinds of other short-term simple minded rewards that change our why. When you are offered a reward, the why is no longer in your heart...it is the reward. There are countless examples in the book.


The stories in DRIVE show us that these reward structures make us less good versions of ourselves. Thankfully, Daniel finds research that shows our minds are moldable (like you may have read in The Shallows by Nicholas Carr). This is the single biggest takeaway from DRIVE, I think - that you can, personally, change your life such that you are working in line with intrinsic (BETTER) motivation like we are wired from birth. He uses the example of babies and toddlers and how they don't need rewards to be curious and busy - they get inner pleasure from actively engaging in their world. Only after we beat our growing and developing selves into automatons with gold stars, right answers, candy, trophies, certificates, etc... do we become slave to external rewards. I also learned that I misunderstood Type A - I am indeed not Type A, yay! but I do have trouble relaxing control of things that I have finished.



I have read several of the scientific studies cited in this book AND I must have a type because I have also read countless books that reference those same studies - mostly about psychology and behavior related in some fashion to economics. I don't mind getting the info again - honestly, that is how I think learning happens, in layers. That being said , there is a lot of material, but Daniel is pulling it all together in a frank and digestible fashion. Thankfully, at the end of the book, Daniel gives a summary of the book, a long list of recommendations for further reading (summarizing each book and giving the reason why it is applicable to his thesis), and a list of questions for further reading. There's also a set of activities for improving the reader's own intrinsic motivation.


I enjoyed this book - perhaps more so because I listened to it right after I finished When (same author). Since the books are both read by the author, the voice is familiar. I dunno about you, but sometimes the narrator gets between me and the content.


Recommended for adult readers - I think middle grades on up could read it, but there are so many references to work life ... and I just don't see kids with the same interest in what drives motivation...or the life history to have seen motivation gone wrong and ‘get' the examples.


Planned to listen? I played this on 2X on Libby and finished it in less than 3 hours.


I listened to this book running > 19 miles on a random Sunday morning for no reason at all, so I am feeling a little smug that I must have some kind of intrinsic motivation. I'm, like 80%. :)