What motivates Equality throughout Anthem and what was most imporatant to him?

Equality is mostly motivated by the feeling that he has more potential to discover than his society allows him to do. His discovery of electricity is significant, as he knows, and he believes that the discovery could make life better for his community. He knows that it is illegal for him to sneak away from his fellows, for him to pursue any activity not sanctioned by his community and participated in by all the street sweepers, but he is too conscious of his own intelligence and potential to ignore them.  
Equality is also motivated by the feeling of wanting to be recognized as an individual. He is always bothered by the fact that he does not have a singular personal pronoun to use to describe just himself and no one else. We see this when he attempts to describe his feelings for Liberty to her.