It seems like a simple question but, in fact, it’s a critically important question to answer honestly. At first glance you might say, “Of course I want to earn a degree and actually I need to earn a degree!” It’s just common sense, right? Since my earliest days of consciousness I have been told and sold on the benefits of an education. Heck, everyone knows that educated people have a better life, make more money and even (it’s a fact) live longer.

But you have known this for sometime and yet you have never pursued a degree. Why do you think that is?

It is because most people (and maybe you too) think about a degree as something that they “need” to do. And how do you feel about things you “need” to do?

I can tell you the mental association we have with needs is painful, not pleasurable. Take for example these phrases: “I need to go on a diet,” “I need to clean out the garage,” “I need to go to the dentist.”

How often have you said, or ever heard anyone say, that they want to go on a diet or want to go to the dentist? They don’t want to because the thought of doing those things is associated with pain. It’s the same as with going to school. If you have put off going back to school, it is probably because you view it as a “need” and not a “want” - which is always associated with pleasure.

Our decisions are always based on avoidance of pain and pursuit of pleasure, or avoidance of doing what we need to do in favor of what we want to do. Don’t feel bad; it’s human nature.

Want to fix it? Then you must change your thoughts about education from a “need” to a “want”.

Smoking is a great example. Everyone knows that smoking is very bad for your health. Unless you live on another planet you know how bad it is. So, why don’t people just quit? It is simply because they associate smoking with pleasure and not being able to smoke as painful. When they reverse those thoughts and add conviction then they finally are able to quit.

You must say, “I want to get my degree because I want to take control of my life, my future, my income, my prosperity. Because I know that without it, I’ll be climbing a mountain with a sack of bricks on my back!” Repeat to yourself, “I know that with each credit I earn, with the passing of each semester, I lose a few bricks and that one day I will stand at graduation holding my key to independence and prosperity.” Hold that thought close to your heart every time you start to have doubts about your ability to accomplish this goal and before you know it you will be a college graduate!