Exogenous Motivation – 3 Ways to Be Internally Motivated

Most people are aware of medical treatments like exogenous TRT (Testosterone Replacement Therapy). As men age, they no longer produce the same levels of testosterone that they once did in their youth. Married men with children have this happen even earlier in life, which is one of the attributing causes to the reasons why many Christian men don’t get the frequency of sex they want.

Many men today have turned to the miracle drug of TRT to make up for these reduced levels. One of the consequences of this therapy is that the natural production of testosterone in your own body is essentially eliminated for life. If you decide to go on TRT, you will be on it forever. You will no longer be able to produce your own testosterone in your own body.

Here is a little bit of vocabulary for those who are interested. When your body produces something like testosterone naturally within your own cells, it is said to be “Endogenous” production. “Endo” means “in, inside, or internal” and “gen” means “formed” or “created“. So endogenous means “formed internally” or “formed inside“. When Leydig cells in your body create testosterone, they are doing so endogenously.

Exogenous, however, means that something is being introduced from the outside, in this case, testosterone.

“Ex” means “out of” or “outside“. So exogenous literally means “created outside“. When you inject testosterone, you are injecting an exogenous compound. That exogenous compound will shut down the endogenous production of testosterone.

Many people think that if they introduce something like testosterone exogenously, it will just stack on top of their natural testosterone production. But this almost never happens. It does not matter what the compound is, if it is introduced from the outside, the body will shut down its natural production of that same compound.

The body is smart, it never wastes resources.

So there is no reason for it to continue making a compound that it is able to get from the outside. The body also self-limits resource production. If it detects that there is enough of a compound in your blood or body, it won’t produce it anymore, at least until it detects low levels again. The optimal levels of that compound in the body have been reached, and the body could spend energy on more important functions rather than adding to an already sufficient level of testosterone.

All of that is to say that if you are in the habit of getting your testosterone from an outside source, you eliminate the ability to create it naturally. This is a metaphor for life.

Also, if you are in the habit of constantly looking outside of yourself for motivation, you are getting motivation exogenously and damaging your ability to create your own motivation.

It should be every man’s goal to learn how to create the motivational fire from within. The motivation for your actions must be internal and driven from a place of personal goals. If you chronically supplement your own externally generated goals with externally generated motivation, you will never be able to motivate yourself.

That is not to say that external motivation is worthless or useless, it isn’t. It is very valuable to occasionally look outside ourselves for motivation. But it must be an occasional thing. We must internalize enough of those motivational stories and images so that we progressively reduce the need to go outside of ourselves for motivation. By doing this we turn ourselves into self-sustaining machines that can work for extended periods of time without rest and without the need for motivation from an external source.

Learn to develop your motivation from within.

1. Learn from outside examples

Acquire motivation externally at first, but reduce this over time by internalizing the stories and lessons you learn. It should be your goal to wean off of external motivation as a baby weans off of milk. You must also get to the point where when you are not as motivated as you want, instead of looking to YouTube or to mentors, you can look into your own mind and create that motivation.

This does start by having many mentors and many external sources of motivation. But you must acknowledge now that it is your primary goal to develop internal motivation. Reduce your need for external help over time. We never get to a place of complete independence as men, but it should act as an ideal nonetheless.

We will always have teachers, mentors, and people who motivate us and help us improve, but we should not be reliant on them to the point of weakness. If we cannot even get off the couch and into the gym without watching workout motivation videos, then we are too dependent on that external motivation.

If you cannot open your Bible and train without being motivated in your Bible study group, then you are too dependent on social structures for your own discipline.

At the end of the day, every man is forced to rely on himself. You can depend on, no one. You can rely on no one. And sadly, you can trust no one but yourself. You are the only one who is going to have the ability to do your own work. You can watch all the workout videos you want, but you have to put in your own work and soak your own shirt in your own sweat if you want to look in the mirror and see any changes in your own body. No one is going to be able to lift you up, you must do everything for yourself.

Your goal is to be a self-sustaining powerhouse of a man who generates his own mental food and energy. That must and always will be the ultimate goal. Then you are no longer just a student, but you are a teacher and mentor to other men who must do the same thing in their own time.

2. Visualize and create those same motivating images within your own mind.

When you watch those motivating workout videos on YouTube, what is happening in your mind? You are filling it with images of the possibilities in this world. You are clearly and vividly reminded of what the body is capable of when men are willing to push it and force it to work. Why can you not do the same thing in your mind?

While it is true that there will almost always be something more motivating about a video compared to what you can visualize in your mind, that is no excuse to avoid developing the powers of visualization and internal motivation. You can vividly create or recreate the same images that you see on the screen in your own mind. You can play the same music, create the same camera cuts and hear the same words as you hear from an external source.

When you notice that you are running low on energy and motivation, instead of running to external sources, try visualization first. Imagine all the same things that normally motivate you. Create them in your own mind. Start working on building images now and it will become progressively easier to do so.

3. Establish identity

Make your identity congruent with your goal. Force yourself to believe that you are acting in accordance with your truest nature when you work towards your goal. This will create more motivation.

One of the greatest human drives is the need to be consistent with one’s self-generated identity. We hate being inconsistent with ourselves.

Hypocrisy is unnatural, but it exists because hypocritical behavior is often dormant. We do not realize that we are violating the very same principles that we preach. Once we realize this, we have two choices. Most people choose to go down the path of denial and rationalization. Somehow their behavior is different or they have a special circumstance. The other path is one of recognition and immediate change. We can take advantage of this powerful human need to be consistent with ourselves and use it as the impetus to adjust our behavior.

To create your identity – who do you want to be?

Imagine vividly the person you want to become and examine your choices now. How are your current choices violating your personal identity? If you can force yourself to see the incongruency and inconsistency, you can spur yourself on to change. Humans hate being incongruent with themselves, so this is an excellent tool for change.

Establish clearly who you want to be and refuse to accept any behavior that violates that identity. This is one of the great benefits of Christianity. It provides a clear, black-and-white identity for human beings. That identity then drives human behavior.

If my identity is that I am a Christain, I am forced to act the way Christians act if I want to be consistent with that identity. I cannot engage in behaviors that violate that identity. If I do, I again, am a hypocrite who will either live in denial of his behavior or realize his asynchronicity and change. A clear and well-defined identity is a tool of massive power.

Try these 3 tools to increase your internal motivation. Reduce your intake of exogenous motivation and become a man of power.

Conduct yourselves like men.