Fuelled From Within: Understanding Motivation | Jax Atchison

Jax Atchison (Edu Inc | Educator and Self-Determination Theory Specialist) unpacks SDT for students, parents and teachers

This fireside chat is for the entire Edu Inc community - students, parents, and teachers - and gives everyone a shared vocabulary around self-determination theory (SDT) so that motivation can be understood, discussed, and improved at home and in the classroom. Hosted by Gershom alongside Mrs Atchison, who has already trained Edu Inc's teaching staff in SDT, this conversation brings that same framework directly to the people it affects most.

Jax Atchison walks through the foundational work of psychologists Richard Ryan and Edward Deci, explaining why motivation has nothing to do with talent or intelligence and everything to do with three psychological needs: autonomy (volition, not just independence), competence (the feeling of getting better, not a fixed skill level), and relatedness (the proven impact of who you surround yourself with). She unpacks why every human brain is wired to be curious, vital, and self-motivated - and what conditions cause that to break down.

The episode maps the full motivation spectrum from amotivation through external regulation, introjected regulation (guilt, shame, fear), identified regulation, integrated regulation, and intrinsic motivation - explaining what each stage looks and feels like for a student, a parent, and a teacher. Gershom and Jax are honest that flow state and pure intrinsic motivation are MicroMoments, not a permanent condition, and that healthy functioning mostly means operating in the identified regulation zone.

For parents, the episode delivers specific, practical guidance: why the word 'should' is one of the most toxic motivation killers in the English language; why consistent rewards and star charts ultimately undermine intrinsic motivation (the Ryan and Deci puzzle-payment study); why surveillance feels like control and kills autonomy; how to give reasons for rules without negotiating them away; and why autonomy-supportive parenting means keeping guardrails in place while offering genuine choices within them. Jax also explains why rewarding the process rather than the result is the single most important shift a parent or teacher can make.

For students, Jax offers five concrete steps to move one place to the right on the motivation spectrum: find your own reason for doing a task; find your challenge edge (the Goldilocks zone between boredom and anxiety); choose your room carefully because we internalise the value systems of the people we spend time with; notice whether your fuel is guilt and shame or genuine purpose; and protect the activities that already bring you joy. Procrastination is reframed not as a character flaw but as a diagnostic symptom of an unmet need in autonomy, competence, or relatedness. And the episode closes with one of the most counter-intuitive insights in the research: action comes before motivation, not the other way around. www.linkedin.com · selfdeterminationtheory.org · www.ted.com · Watch this episode on YT · EduInc website · Facebook (Public) · Facebook (closed group) · Twitter (closed group) · YouTube · Review us on Google