Bribery For Good Behavior

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Life is a lot of give and take.  You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours.  I know charity comes from the heart and you’re not doing it for any sort of recognition, but even charitable things you get something out of.  That good feeling that you helped someone out.  But even still, we do recognize those who volunteer and donate money and time.  It’s just the right thing to do.  We say thank you when someone does a good deed for us.  And you will continue to benefit from others charity so long as you’re courteous and say thank you.

So see, everything in life is give and take.  And I’m going to admit in my house this is a lesson that is taught early on around here.  Call it bribery if you want, but I prefer to think of it as if you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours.

Everything in our day to day life is a trade off of services and rewards for certain behaviors.  All the way down to the celebration of fictional characters like the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus.

I Find Easter And Christmas Great Bargaining Tools

Don’t get me wrong, I always express the reason for the season to my children.  At Christmas it is better to give than it is to receive.  At Easter, rejoicing in the sacrifice the lord our savior made to atone for our sins.  But the added bonus for everyone this time of year is that Santa Claus comes and puts presents under the tree, or the Easter Bunny leaves us Easter baskets filled with chocolates and bunnies.

But it only happens if you are good little boys and girls.  So yes, I use the Easter Bunny and Santa Claus to my advantage to remind my children to use their manners, to talk not yell, to walk not run.  It tends to be something that’s brought up year round, remember Santa’s always watching you.  The Easter Bunny knows what you’re up to.  Of course it works much better when we’re closer to those holidays and we have the constant reminders of Santa and the Easter Bunny on every street corner.

And as the reward of presents under the tree or baskets filled with candy comes upon us I begin to think what ever will I do to continue to encourage their good behavior.

There’s Always Something

We don’t really NEED the Easter Bunny and Santa to encourage certain behavior.  It’s nice to have to shake things up a bit.  We can also use every day events.

• Oh, you got invited to a birthday party that you really want to go to?  Okay, well, make sure your room is clean by that day and you can go.
• There’s a show you really want to watch on TV?  Okay, well then you need to show me you can sit still and watch it quietly.
• It is a beautiful day outside and you can go out to play as soon as your homework is done and you have read for 20 minutes.
• Yes, those cookies do look good, if you want one for dessert then you have to finish your green beans at dinner.

Bribery, give and take, or whatever you want to call it these are life lessons here people.   We have to do the things we don’t want to do to get to the things we want for the rest of our lives.  Hard work gives us money to do things like go on vacation.  Sacrifices have to be made to get to a better place in life.  This is what I’m teaching my children every single day.

The kids have to pitch in and do their chores so it frees up more time for me to play with them, or so I can cook them a nice meal.  It makes me much happier when the kids pitch in which makes me more fun to be around too.

And whether we’re volunteering or just doing our day to day stuff it always feels good when we have accomplished something for ourselves and for others in the end.  The journey is half the battle.

Do you bribe your kids to do thing?  Do you call it bribery or something else?