Rewarding Penalty

Rewards always bring a smile and penalty becomes the reason to frown. We live our life wanting to be rewarded for all our good deeds, acknowledge, and appreciate when something positive happens through our way. Have you given a thought how can a penalty be rewarding? Do we assess the reward which comes in the package of a penalty?

Life is a journey and not a destination. Then why do we always focus on destination? From childhood our every action is focused on the destination. General conversation with a kid has a standard question: “what do you want to become when you grow up?” The kid may not even know the meaning of growing up, but we still expect an answer which is acceptable by the society. Adults always focus on achieving something in future forgetting the present. We are applauded when we do right as a kid and that becomes a habit to hear that applause in the journey of life. As a kid learning to walk is the journey and every step taken is appreciated but once we learn to walk it is like reaching the destination. No one appreciates you now for knowing to walk. This example might make you laugh but the logic behind this is intended to change your perception about rewards and penalty. We learn during the journey and not at the destination. So why destination is given so much importance and the journey forgotten?

 Journey teaches us a lot of things which we accept, appreciate, acknowledge, ignore, negate, hate, love and what not. At every step we always like to be rewarded. No one likes to be penalized. But when penalty is accepted in the right spirit, it always becomes a reward for life.

As parents we reward kids for their achievements but fail to focus on their journey to reach that achievement. Bad behavior is punished thinking it will teach them what is right. We tend to forget punishment hurts but penalty can be rewarding. Kids learn more from what they observe than from what is told to them. When we reward results, we indirectly tell them the journey doesn’t matter. In a math exam, teachers always encourage us to show the steps of our solution to a problem so even if the answer is wrong, we do get marks for the way we worked through that problem. Losing 1 mark out of a 5mark problem is that rewarding penalty which will teach us a lot about life. When we undermine the process, we unknowingly punish ourselves for being right. In the process of learning, this punishment makes us choose end results over the path to reach that result.

Demands of kids are often associated with a criteria which parents use as a secret weapon which neither the kids know nor the parents are aware that their way of rewarding kids can be a pointed weapon in shaping the personality of their kids. If a child asks for a bicycle, then we say do well in your exam and I will get what you want. This system of rewarding becomes a way to channelize the ask. Children learn that every good deed in my parents’ checklist might get me what I want. We become traders, negotiators and businesspeople in our own relationship. Teaching kids to learn the value of effort and worth of the result is a challenging task because we adults lack that knowledge.

When we give pocket money to our daughter, we give her the freedom to decide how she wants to spend it, but she can spend that only after we approve her decision. Here, the journey is she making the decision, which is valued, and the result of this journey will be rewarded only if she chose the right path in taking that decision. She has to face the penalty if she chose the wrong path in making that decision which will be our denial of her decision to spend. She won’t be punished by depriving her of her pocket money but she will be given another chance to make the right decision in the right direction. Correction is important and this can come with rewarding penalty but when we change our focus to punishment, then neither the journey nor the destination becomes rewarding.

Recently my daughter lost her English textbook in school. She had no clue how it got misplaced. When she found out about her book being lost, she was upset but I was angry for her not being careful of her things. She knew if this is lost, her parents will buy a new one so there was no sense of responsibility though she did have a bit of guilt. For a week we delayed buying the book and told her it was her responsibility to take care of her things and now to find what is lost. She did make all the efforts to search but was not successful. After a week we decided to buy the book but we asked her to pay for this. It was the penalty she had to pay for being careless about what she gets and has. This penalty rewarded her with the sense of responsibility because now she knew if she takes anything she has for granted she has to pay a price and if she makes genuine effort she won’t be punished even if the outcome is not what was expected.

Penalty can be painful just like punishment. But the difference pitches in with time. Punishment focuses on what we lost. Penalty focuses on how we can improve what we gain. When we are rewarded only our tangible achievements are appreciated. Penalty rewards our tangible and intangible efforts.

Life is like an express train where penalty is the journey through a tunnel. It is dark but it is still moving. Don’t pull the chain and stop the train by punishment. We can only reach the destination when we pass through those dark tunnels which might be unpleasant but can also be rewarding because only when the outside world has nothing to show, we start looking within ourselves to make life beautiful.

Punishment makes us halt our faults.
               Penalty lets us move ahead along with faults.

Rewards acknowledges achievements which can be achieved only when you choose to move ahead in spite of the faults. Choose a rewarding penalty which celebrates the journey and not just focuses to celebrate destination.