Comment by doright

People just have to want to like things. If they don't like something enough then a near-ubiquitous form of outsourcing is now available for them to get carried away with.

The "wanting to like things" is a highly undervalued skill/trait. It comes down to building a habit through repetition - not necessarily having fun or getting results, but training your mind like a muscle to think putting in effort isn't that bad an activity.

For those growing up I think this is not something that is taught - usually it is already there as a childlike sense of wonder that gets pruned by controlling interests. If education forcing you to do math removes any enthusiasm you had for math, that's largely determined by circumstance. You'd need someone else to tell you the actual joys of X to offset that (and I'd guess most parents/teachers don't practice math for fun), or just spontaneously figuring out how interesting X is totally on one's own which is even rarer.

I didn't have either so I'm a mathophobe, but I'm alright with that since I have other interests to focus on.