What motivates us people?

My daughter started to learn piano 2 years ago. She never really showed great interest in it so she refused to practice it most of the time. But she likes to go to the class every Saturday for half an hour, so we just keep sending her there. Three and a half months ago, she cried in the piano class two times in a row, then told me it was too hard and she didn’t want to learn piano anymore. I asked her to go four more lessons and if she still decided to give up, then so be it. And then, a couple weeks later, all of the sudden she became loving the piano and started to practice it every day since then. There were two possible reasons for this change. Possibility #1: my neighbor’s teenage son can play piano very beautifully. One day, my daughter heard him play. When we came back home, she still talked about how good he played. Possibility #2: Her baby brother started to learn piano three months ago and he loves it and practices it every day.

I am wondering what really motivates my daughter: the inspiration by the greatness, the peer pressure, or the eagerness for competitions?

Now, what about grown-ups? What motivates us? I wish I could say that we are pursuing for the greatness - or at least for money, glory and sex. But hell no, I believe a lot of us are being motivated by fear right now: fear of losing jobs/clients, fear of not being able to provide enough for our loved ones, fear of …

PS. Come to think about it. This fear thing is not all bad. At least, it can come in handy when we workaholics need to work three weekends in a row. Instead of getting the usual response from our spouses such as “This is ridiculous. You are just being selfish and greedy,” now we can simply give out a puppy sad face and say, “ Honey, this is how people survive these days. What else can I do?” And you would gain her/his understanding and support at a 100 percent. Not all bad indeed.