This post is the fifth in a series hosted by UC Berkeley’s TAUG and the Claremont Colleges’ hearhere. In this weekly series, staff writers from both journals will be sharing their perspectives on the COVID-19 global pandemic. Click here for more information on hearhere. Why is it so hard to get out of bed? As the semester rolls to a close, motivation seems to be evaporating at a greater pace than before, even as our workload continues to increase. The last few weeks of a normal school year are nearly always the busiest — final exams, projects, and papers are compounded by the need to bid farewell to our peers. Yet this spring, it feels incredibly different. Online classes seem to be sputtering to a close rather than charging through the finish line, and each Zoom call seems to be longer than the last, with fewer compelled to show up while the rest trickle in wearing pajamas. Our seemingly universal loss of motivation and energy belies a deeper explanation for our hollow lack of vigor, and should prompt us to consider the underlying foundations of our motivation. By comparing our situation to the parable of two houses from the Gospel of Luke in the Bible, we can better understand why sources of internal motivation serve as a solid, lasting foundation, whereas sources of external motivation only generate the illusion of permanence. As we examine our array of external motivators, we start to see just how rapidly they have lost relevance and meaning. Take, for example, the dwindling job market and the bevy of canceled internships. Our once hopeful and competitive outlook on our future prospects has been swiftly replaced by a somber sense of resignation and uncertainty. As we scramble to find contingency plans and remote opportunities, the overwhelming feeling of futility can quickly diminish our motivation to keep searching for the next resume-building opportunity. Similarly, the once-pervasive need for productivity on campus — to be a holistic student not merely invested in academics, but also a wide range of extracurriculars — has been replaced with a desperate search for ways to entertain ourselves. Week after week, new trends, memes, and forms of entertainment have taken hold, from playing Animal Crossing to baking sourdough bread, as evidenced by the sudden scarcity of Nintendo Switch consoles and all-purpose flour. Even being in community, where expressions of selflessness imbue our lives with much greater meaning, has been undeniably difficult. As we reduce all of our normal human contact to video and audio channels, our mental health has understandably taken a toll. According to a recent article in the National Geographic, spending hours calling on video communication platforms is “extremely hard on the brain,” leading to fatigue and overstimulation. Holding onto the false expectation that virtual communication can somehow serve as an adequate substitute for productive, physical interactions only leaves us tired, jaded, and unfulfilled. These few examples lay bare the reality that a motivation and energy for life built upon our human ambitions, desires, and expectations can be easily disrupted. Just like “a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation,” we may find the lives we’ve built for ourselves swept away by the unpredictable winds of life; the things that once anchored our reality tossed about like waves on the ocean. While some of us have found ways to adapt to, distract from, or cope with our respective situations, many more are anxiously awaiting the day we can just forget about this unwanted, destructive interruption and return to our normal pursuits. Yet to forget that we can and should use this time to strengthen the foundation beneath our motivation only guarantees the return of aimlessness and meaninglessness. This crisis will pass, and the things that once motivated us — ambition, societal pressures, money, friends, family — will all return in full force, likely just as they were. But if we don’t undertake a serious, mindful evaluation of what keeps us going in life, we’ll simply find ourselves asking yet again, “Is this really it?” Instead, we ought to follow the example of the other man who was well-prepared and unshaken in the face of a ruinous flood. When building his metaphorical life “house,” he wisely “dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock” (Luke 6:48). Likewise, we can strive to carefully rebuild our foundations in this time, using the weeks and months to come as a chance to rediscover and reimagine the true motivation behind the things we choose to do. As our lives gradually return to normalcy, we need to drill past the surface level indicators of our motivations and dig deeper until we reach our genuine, intrinsic motivations. But as we burrow deeper in self-reflection, we may find our own wells and aquifers dry — depleted from years of trying to make it on our own. Carefully curated Instagram feeds have belied a deep need to be accepted; meticulously crafted resumes have disguised a deep need to be valued; endless swiping on Tinder have hidden a deep need to not be alone. But faced with the choice of continuously trying to draw water from our own dry wells or drinking from “a spring of [living] water welling up to eternal life,” we can still choose to “never be thirsty again” (John 4:13–14). The living water that Jesus offers does not promise to miraculously wipe away our feelings of loss and lack of energy; nor does it seek to replace our friends and family who push us to be our best. Rather, it nourishes and refreshes the dry, cracked beds of our hearts. It reminds us that we are lovable just the way we are, that we have already been accepted by God, and that we will never be alone. It’s living water because, if we let it pour into ourselves, it brings back life — life eternal — that sustains and is abundant. It’s this life, and only this life, anchored in One who is greater than, and not tied to the passing sands of our ever-changing world, that truly satisfies. Evan Chuu is a fourth-year at Pomona College majoring in Linguistics and minoring in Spanish.
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