perldiver

Hatred is a powerful emotion. So powerful that even the word itself is somewhat taboo--no one wants to talk about hatred, except the people who are using it as leverage against an opponent. Racial hatred, hate crimes--true or not, the mere accusation can stain a person's reputation forever.

But when you come right down to it, hatred is just an emotion like love, fear, anger, affection, trust, or desire. All of these are tools that the nonexistent hand of evolution has used to program survival behaviors into us. Love and trust make us take care of our mates and children, ensuring the survival of our genes. Anger and hatred make us fight back against the other caveman who stole our haunch of meat so that he doesn't keep doing it.

The bad news for society is that hatred is one of the most powerful emotions for motivating action, and it generally motivates negative actions. The good news for society is that hatred isn't really that common. Sure, most of us have had a boss or a girl- / boyfriend who got on our nerves, but how many of us can point to a person or individual that we completely and sincerely wish would vanish from the face of the Earth--preferably in a painful fashion? There is only one entity that I really feel such a desire towards (I'm deliberately being vague over whether it's a person, a group, or a company). This will be my Recipient (see below).

For the month of April, I'm going to try an experiment: I'm going to use hatred as a motivation to improve myself--or, as the psychtechs would say, "to instill desired behaviors and eliminate undesired ones".


I've set out two transparent containers in plain sight, labelled "Carrot" and "Stick". Every morning, I'm going to start chugging through my task list for that day. At the end of each day, for every task that is completed I put some money (maybe 50 cents, maybe $1, I haven't decided) in the "Carrot" jar; for every task that is not complete, I put that amount in the "Stick" jar. At the end of April, all of the money in the "Stick" jar gets anonymously sent to my Recipient. I really, REALLY do not want to send money to that entity.

On the positive side, I've also chosen a reward for myself. At the end of the month, all of the money in the "Carrot" drawer will be applied towards that reward.

Some implementation details and specifications for edge cases:

• Any "Stick" money must be sent by 5pm four business days after the month is up (in this case, that means by 5pm on May 6).

• The task list needs to be set out in advance, and not composed ex post facto at the end of the day. (i.e., can't just say "well, I did X and that's good, so I'll put $1 in Carrot")


• Elements can be added to the task list during the day, but only if I started with a task list.


• Things that aren't on the task list at EOD don't count towards Carrot or Stick

• If I finish the task list early I may choose to start on tomorrow's tasks


• Each day, the first task on my task list will be "work out"


• Each day, the final three tasks will be:
  
  
  
  • prepare tomorrow's list
  • prep / lay out whatever I'm going to need for tomorrow's tasks
  • post today's progress to LJ

I'm also leaving myself a little wiggle room. Sometimes when you start a task, new information comes up that changes the value you place on the task--for example, today I went to buy the special thank you notes that I've been meaning to get for a long time. There was so much difficulty finding the correct ones that I was just about to say "this isn't worth my time" and drop the task.

So, after a good faith examination, I can do any of the following with a task:

• Complete it (counts toward "Carrot")


• Fail it (counts towards "Stick") if it's not done at end of day and I'm not going to get it done


• Decide to drop it because it isn't relevant, I decide I don't really care, etc. (Doesn't count toward either Carrot or Stick)


• Defer it based on new information.

Deferred tasks must be deferred to a specific date and revisited on that date. Finally, I will not defer a task three times. I will either complete it, drop it, or mark it failed.

When I employ my "rules mechanic brain", I can see half a dozen ways to exploit this system. The good news is, I won't use them; one good habit that I do have is that I'm honest with myself. The whole point of this effort is to reduce my feelings of guilt from not having done the things I know I should be doing.


I'd really appreciate it if everyone reading this would help me out by offering the occasional comment or poking me if I miss a progress update. I'll make liberal use of LJ-cut so that people are not swarmed with my daily task lists and if you'd like to be filtered off of them completely, just let me know.