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Comment by medvezhenok | Hacker News Reader

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medvezhenok

True. Work motivation is usually tied to one of these things:

1) Acquiring status / proving yourself (qualifying for a better romantic partner, etc). More applicable for men.

2) Servicing existing debt (student loans, mortgage, etc)

3) Providing for a family (somewhat similar to 1 - but for future goals)

4) Securing a legacy/reputation

Although the most important drive in work is seeing a path towards upwards mobility (i.e. if I work hard then my lot in life can improve - not in an absolute sense, but in a relative sense. Meaning that I will be better off than my neighbor. This ties in to status games and mate competition from (1)).

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I'd like to work as a means of self-actualization [0] (by working on private projects), but it's hard to find the time as this (currently) doesn't pay the bills.

So currently I am at stage 'Providing for a family', while I do a little bit of self-actualisation whenever I can find some free time.

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[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-actualization

In regards to 4)

I ᴍᴇᴛ a Traveller from an antique land, Who said, “ Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desart.[17] Near them, on the sand, Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown, And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read, Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed: And on the pedestal these words appear: “ My name is Oᴢʏᴍᴀɴᴅɪᴀs, King of Kings.” Look on my works ye Mighty, and despair! No thing beside remains. Round the decay Of that Colossal Wreck, boundless and bare, The lone and level sands stretch far away.

Ozymandias was Ramesses II. He lived three thousand years ago. Lots of his buildings remain now, lots of territories he conquered remain part of Egypt, his mummy was found, thousands of people every day come to see his face and hair which remained intact. In Egypt he's known as "The Great Ancestor" and every schoolkid knows his name.

A reading of Ozymandias would say he has secured the legacy.. Even though nothing remains of his kingdom, that statue still stands and boldly proclaims to the world that Ozymandis lived and conquered.

It's all about scope though. Sure he might have lived a couple of thousands of years ago. Humanity still is only a blip on the whole history of the earth.

Maybe in 100.000 years even he will be forgotten as well, but he did get his 15 minutes of fame (relatively speaking), I'll give you that :)

Perhaps the easiest way to secure a legacy is creating the long lasting object with whichever claims you’d like and skipping the actual building of the kingdom

I like that thinking.. I am going to create my own history kinda like how the man who claimed to have conned everyone was lying about him conning everyone (and thus conning a different set of everyone :) )

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