Imagine the best, funniest, most successful version of yourself. Then live in it to the fullest.
“She’s a hard worker. That’s what I really like about Beyoncé. You can see it in her presentation that she has put some time and energy into it. She’s a Virgo. Virgos are very hard workers, I’ve noticed that.”
— Aretha Franklin
BTS: B’DAY MUSIC VIDEOS (2006)
BTS: THE FORMATION WORLD TOUR (RALEIGH) (2016)
BEHIND THE SCENES: THE 2014 MTV VMAS (2014)
BTS OF DANCE FOR YOU (2011)
BTS OF LOVE ON TOP (2011)
DESTINY’S CHILD - TOAZTED INTERVIEW (2001)
HOMECOMING: A FILM BY BEYONCÉ (2019)
I AM… YOURS (2009)
MIC AND A LIGHT (2009)
MAKING OF REVEL (2012)
“To put it bluntly, and contrarian as it may sound: I think the assumption that you need to “motivate yourself” in order to take action is a big part of what stops us taking action on the things that matter most. Think, for a moment, about the picture of human nature implied by the idea of getting motivated. The premise is that if you want to get around to what matters, you’ll need to gin yourself up, fighting your natural tendency toward inertia, summoning fresh reserves of energy, plus a can-do mindset. And that you can expect all this to require a constant replenishment of effort: drop the effort for too long, and you’ll slide right back into passivity, pathetic worm that you are. This is motivation as Newtonian physics (with some added moral overtones): you’d better keep pushing that billiard ball, or it’s guaranteed to slow back down to a standstill. Perhaps there’s some truth to this (and it’s certainly how the challenge of action can feel, for example if you’re depressed). But as a mental model of how things work psychologically, it’s a disaster. It entails constantly sending yourself the message that your default state is one of laziness and time-wasting, and that you must watch yourself like a hawk if you’re to have any hope of remaining on task. […] And so it’s worth considering the alternative. What if it’s taking action, rather than not taking action, that’s the default or “natural” state of affairs? In other words: what if the main problem, when it comes to meaningful productivity, isn’t that we can’t get ourselves to work on what matters, but that we construct psychological barriers that get in the way of actions that might otherwise occur without too much effort?”
— Oliver Burkeman, In your own way
