Motivation 101, Part 9

The purpose here is to reward yourself for a job well done. This is positive reinforcement. The reward is an opportunity to stop and smell the roses that bloom as a result of your hard work. -K. Jeffrey Miller

Well good Monday morning to everyone!  Time to jump start another week.  The good news is that next weekend is a 3 day weekend--so keep that in mind as we all get up and work to avoid  a case of the Mondays!

Today's topic is about self-rewards.  As we have been talking for nearly 2 months now about goals, it is a good time to sit back and reflect upon the progress we have made toward that goal.  Perhaps the goal has been reached entirely--and if so, congratulations and I look forward to hearing what your next goal is.  If your goal has not been reached, let us use this time to sit back and assess our progress.  After all, a goal is a finish line, but there are a lot of mile markers in between the start and the finish, and each one of those is an opportunity to celebrate.

One of my favorite rewards--pedis!!

Here is the time for you to respond.  What progress have you made toward your goal?  Are you up to being able to do 5 push ups a day?  Have you cut back to smoking 2 less cigarettes per day?  Have you lost 5 pounds?  Have you saved $100?  Have you integrated vegetables into your diet 2 more times per day?  Have you clocked your top speed at a competition? 

Now comes the next response time--what have you done to celebrate this?  These milestones are often overlooked as they seem like "not very much," but tell me what can be more encouraging than celebrating the milestones so we don't give up before we meet our actual goal?  I honestly don't know very many people that reward themselves as they should, and it was certainly a difficult concept for me to grasp at one point.  Rewarding yourself can be as simple as giving yourself permission to sleep in one morning when you might otherwise get up and start cleaning.  It can be buying yourself a book or a new outfit.  It can be self-pampering or even food (as long as your goal is not food/weight related). 

So this is a double sound-off, I suppose--tell me where you are in your journey to reaching your goal, and tell me what have you or what will you do to reward yourself?  After all, you've done the work so you might as well get some credit for it!!