Dr Paul Allen

  The Bible tells me I am to store up treasures in heaven. It tells me there are eternal rewards for decisions I make in this life and it tells me I should desire these rewards and act accordingly. And yet sometimes I feel the desire for reward is a sign of spiritual weakness rather than strength, like that is for lesser Christians and that I should grow beyond it.  I struggle with the idea that I am to be motivated to obey God in this world by the promise of reward in the next. It has always struck me as wrong, as something a little bit less than noble, that I would obey God not purely and solely out of a desire to obey him, but out of a desire to increase my eternal reward. Have you ever wondered about that? Is it wrong to be motivated by rewards? Somehow in my mind it seems like the reward must negate the joy or the purity of obedience, and especially when it comes to the way I handle money. Shouldn’t I want to give out of the joy of obedience? Shouldn’t I want

Image via Wikipedia Derek Sivers  makes a compelling case  against  going public with your goals in  his short talk  at the 2010 Ted Conference. (The talk is only a little over three minutes long.) His basic premise is this: telling someone your goals makes them less likely to happen. Why is this true? According to him, it is because you get the psychological satisfaction of accomplishing the goal without having to actually do the work. In other words,  talking becomes a substitute for  doing . This goes against conventional goal-setting wisdom. However, Sivers cites the work of several psychologists, including Kurt Lewin , Wera Mahler, and  Peter Gollwitzer . He then describes a fascinating study that Dr. Gollwitzer conducted in 2009. In four separate tests, 163 people wrote down a personal goal. Half of them announced their commitment to their goal; half of them didn’t. Then they were given 45-minutes to work toward their goal but told that they could stop at any time. Those who ha

Image via Wikipedia Derek Sivers  makes a compelling case  against  going public with your goals in  his short talk  at the 2010 Ted Conference. (The talk is only a little over three minutes long.) His basic premise is this: telling someone your goals makes them less likely to happen. Why is this true? According to him, it is because you get the psychological satisfaction of accomplishing the goal without having to actually do the work. In other words,  talking becomes a substitute for  doing . This goes against conventional goal-setting wisdom. However, Sivers cites the work of several psychologists, including Kurt Lewin , Wera Mahler, and  Peter Gollwitzer . He then describes a fascinating study that Dr. Gollwitzer conducted in 2009. In four separate tests, 163 people wrote down a personal goal. Half of them announced their commitment to their goal; half of them didn’t. Then they were given 45-minutes to work toward their goal but told that they could stop at any time. Those who ha