Tackle Life Together

A blog by Sally Waters

sally [at] homescrum .co.uk

Tip jar

Community

Creative Commons License

Beeminder

Beeminder logo
Beeminder screenshot

Beeminder is a website where you can make promises to yourself that come with real stakes. You track your success or progress with a certain goal, and if you fall off the wagon, you will get ‘stung’. This punishment can involve losing a fixed amount of your real, actual money, which can also be linked up to be given to an ‘anti-charity’: a cause you can’t stand, like a political party you don’t support.

So, this uses negative reinforcement rather than positive to motivate people, and it can work. However, I have since stopped using it because it caused me quite a lot of stress, and I would urge users to be very careful to not be too harsh on themselves: set only one goal, make it a very easy one, and don’t tie yourself to the worst types of punishment available. If you have doubts about how you would feel about using it, steer clear.

Word of mouth is the main way people who might need Home Scrum find this blog. Please share this post: