Personal Rewards and Positive Reinforcement

One of the best ways to motivate yourself is offering a series of little rewards along the way as you accomplish each task or accomplish a goal. Gratifying oneself for a job well done or eliminating a bad habit serves as a positive reinforcement to your psyche.

Make arrangements with yourself to celebrate each time you solve a problem, gain a new idea or insight and complete your goal. Laud each of your achievements to reinforce you to do more. You can reward yourself with material things, kind and encouraging words and time for fun and entertainment. But get back on track immediately.

And to keep yourself focused on your major goals, fill your mind with the benefits and the payoff of a dream fulfilled. Think and feel how it would feel like to finally attain your wildest dreams.

The efforts you put in each area of your life will produce its benefits. Improvement in your communication will produce better relationships. Efforts to develop better plans and put in added values to your job or business will result in more money and increased bank balance.

People can offer you incentives or perks for a job well done or a task accomplished but the best kind of stimulus comes from within you. Your personal satisfaction is the best encouragement you can give yourself. The pride that comes from your own approval is the best achievement you will ever feel.

Rewarding Oneself

On quitting smoking.

Even if you manage to quit smoking for a day, you have accomplished a goal. Anchor the feeling of having it made. Affirm to yourself that you can do it again another day. Use the money that you would have bought the packet of cigarettes to purchase something valuable equivalent to it. Better still, save and see it grow each day.

On managing your eating habit.

The one thing you should not do is to compensate yourself with more food. The minute you can push aside a plate of food, you have succeeded in controlling your eating habit. Decide what your weight goal is and then work toward it. You can celebrate with each pound that you shed. Get yourself a new dress or have a picture taken. Look at what you were and how you would want to look like.

On accomplishing a career goal.

Take yourself for a trip or holiday. Pamper yourself with things that you usually do not get to experience like going for a full body or foot massage. Celebrate with your loved ones and give yourself a pat for a job well done.

Whatever positive efforts you put in will produce new knowledge, insights, determination and more money. Your perseverance to stick to your goals will result in the most fulfilling and rewarding experience and get you out of the rut you are in. Life will reward you in the form of more gains, happiness, success, better relationships, good health and peace of mind.

"The way positive reinforcement is carried out is more important than the amount." - B. F. Skinner