#WordyWednesday #3 – January 2017 – #BarWoWe
Call it what you will, incentives are what get people to work harder.
– Nikita Khrushchev
Incentives by any other name could be just plain old accountability and is so enmeshed in our way of living without us even realising it.
As we human beings love to procrastinate or find it comfortable to follow an easier /known path , accountability is the only way to ensure timeliness, good behaviour and discipline from us.
Also, most of them have become the reason for following the right path when in fact we should use our brains to realise the path is our reality.
So we wear a helmet or seat belt while driving to avoid a Challan and not to be safe – Go figure!
We pay our bills on time to avoid being penalised by a late fee charge; so basically we are saving money. Never mind the fact that we have to pay for what we had utilised 😉
In india, it takes a monetary scheme issued by the government to make people realise that it’s more profitable to let a girl child live.
Then there are parents who offer incentives (a carrot/reward or a stick/punishment) to their children for good behaviour, grades, eating food, etc. Even school teachers use similar approach to instill discipline in their charges.
There are heaps of wise quotes that drive home the same message – do good to receive good!!!
Take a lot at the popular adage “Early bird gets the worm” or its variant “Early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.”– the message that’s been put across is if we become early risers, we benefit in lots of ways by gaining profits.
When we groan and moan at something tough in life, we get to hear “No pain, no gain.” Also these are my fitness instructor’s favourite words; but then he is a sadist who loves watching me sweat 😜
The one thing that really cracks me up about Incentives is our bargaining prowesses with which we indulge in with God!
Our prayers are mostly based on the premise that if God grants us something we will offer him 20 coconuts or shave our hair or walk barefoot or stay hungry – all popular modes of offering the almighty “bribe” to give us what we want.
Whether this bribery is effective or just wishful thinking, I leave to you to gauge. 😊
In fact let me ask you what do you think? What’s your most used “incentive” to get your work done? How effective is it?
I am writing daily this month as a part of the Ultimate Blog Challenge. This is my post for day 23.
Linking this post with #BarWoWe prompt for this week.
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Shalini, your writing is just getting better and better with each post. You seem to be really enjoying writing now, and it comes through. Keep going!
I bribe myself with the most incentives!
15 minutes of Twitter browsing after writing the first draft of a post, and so on and so forth.
I also bribe God, and demand back my bribes if he doesn’t come through with his side of the bargain ;))))
Ahhhhh Mayuri you know the magic words to make me happy. Thank you so much gorgeous for your lovely words. I take so much strength n inspiration from your writing.
I too have self rewards, nothing in my life will move forward if I didn’t
We all believe in barter system..we always want something in return
True that Mahek ☺
Everyone and everything in life works because of a reason. You can call it barter ,incentive,love, whatever.But it’s there .And it works .Sometimes subtly and sometimes with guns blazing .
How true Amzee, love your version of incentives…
Actually I have stopped bribing God. I am taking life’s curves as it comes along the way. My most used incentive is ‘appreciation’. Appreciate the efforts and the motivation levels are sky high.
A lovely post, Shalini. 🙂
Wow Rohan that’s such a mature and strong approach to life. I always slip back into it, no matter how many times I make a resolve to not too.
I love your incentive- it goes to show how nice a person you are. Kudos to you and thanks for your thoughts on my post cheers
Fun post! Quite agree, we’d do anything for some incentives, wouldn’t we? 😉
My morning cup of coffee is my incentive to get out of bed in the morning. A piece of cake if I workout. And so it on!
Ha ha Aditi I do love your quirky incentives… They are really cute. We do need to conjure these up to keep us on our toes, or I know for sure I will become a big-time lazy bum
I keep telling myself that if I finish a certain task, then I will do something that I love for a while. That is how I manage to get my work done 😛 Incentives are important!
Yeah Reema I agree they are important. I get so much peace of mind by fixing them fir myself to do my tasks…
Incentive really works wonders! I to do it for myself. A little treat occasionally to push me to do better.
I agree Under preet. That’s important to push oneself and make sure that we do the work
I do think incentives work…let’s face it…how many of us would work for no money? As much as I love what I do, I still would like to be paid for it. Through uni and school, I’d reward myself especially for studying or getting through some assignments I wasn’t fond of. Things that were a chore needed some sort of incentive to get through. That could be reading a few chapters of my favourite book or eating my favourite chocolate. When I was trying to get back into exercising some years ago, I’d reward myself by buying a coffee. It worked! 😀
Ha ha Sanchie I wonder how many of us see our salaries as incentives… We ask/expect incentives on top of our salaries…
But yeah I agree with self rewards to push ourselves to do things we shirk from…
Interesting argued Shalini…..greedy lots we are….:)
Ha ha Sunaina…. Thanks