What Motivates Me?

The last few weeks have been spent thinking deeply about what motivates me for the obvious reason that I needed to tell the people at the university exactly that and if I have to tell them, well then obviously I have to know.

The problem is that I’m pretty sure that the answer I came up with, self improvement, will not go down too well with the board; for the simple reason that they’ve probably heard it a hundred times before and didn’t believe it the first time they heard it, either.

Which is bloody annoying, because in my case I actually realy do mean it. My life ambition has become self-improvement, with the underlying ambition of being recognised for my accomplishments. Of course, that you really, totaly and absolutely can’t write in your letter of motivation. It’s a bit like them asking ‘why do you want to work for our company?’ and you answering ‘because I want money, your money specifically.’ I can think of worse things to say (e.g. I want to get close to you so that I can sleep with your daughter, wife and/or dead grandmother) but not many.

So why does it matter that I don’t want to tell them something they’ve heard a hundred times before? Isn’t it a good idea to go with the tried and proven? Well, no. I can’t play it safe as I don’t actually qualify for their study. If I play it safe they’ll pick somjebody else who played it safe who does actually qualify.

So I have to hit them with a whopper of a letter that makes them think, ‘hey, maybe we should invite this guy in for a talk’. Once I’ve accomplished that, I’ll be that step closer. From there it will be just a matter of talking my way inside (yes, just. It might not be just, but I’d rather worry about one thing at a time (well, twenty things, I’m also worried about not having a job, not having a bank account, not having a house, not being registered in Holland, not having a great deal of money and what I’m eating for dinner; but that’s not what I’m writing about in this post – stop distracting me!))

And now you’re expecting me to tell you how I’m going to do that. I would tell you, but unfortunately I don’t know yet. I wrote one recomendation letter, but it was turned down by two ‘editors’ so I’ve been forced to do it again. Once I’ve got a result, I’ll be sure to share it with you all (once it’s got me inside, that is).