Hexagon incentive system
On a 28 by 22 inch poster board, I drew 100 hexagons. Legally, they’re hexagons - a plane figure with six straight sides and angles - even though I eyeballed them into existence with a yardstick. A protractor plus ruler would have been better utensils for creating more recognizable shapes. If any of my family members need a last-minute Christmas gift idea, please buy me a protractor. For reference, a protractor is the semi-circle piece of plastic that you’re required to buy in the fourth grade, but also a tool for measuring angles. The market value of the pseudo ninja star (because 4th graders don’t care about angles) ranges from $1 to $5 (and 7 to 20 feet of fling). School supplies aside, the general idea was to mimic honeycombs, so I colored the hexagons orange, until I lost my orange sharpie and had to switch to red. The purpose of my sorry, discolored beehive was to incentivize myself to study for my actuarial tests.
If you couldn’t tell, I’ve been writing less. With the extra time, I’ve been studying more. As part of that intent, I’ve created an incentive system. For every hour that I study, I earn 1 hexagon, redeemable by branding the beehive with a date-stamp, and one step further, for each hexagon I earn $1 towards something indulgent. Taped to the posterboard is a crisp $100 bill, ready for the taking. The hexagons help mask the fact that I’m incentivizing myself at a measly rate of $1 an hour. I’m sure that I’d be peeved if I did a cost analysis of my time. Anyways, once I record 100 hexagons I’m going to throw away the $100 at a casino.
One of my bucket list items is to win a poker tournament. As a statistics major, I gravitate towards games of probability in the same way a moth gravitates towards a bug zapper. Both the moth and I expect different results the next time we fly into our respective zappers; however, the core difference between myself and a moth is that I bought and read a book on poker strategy. Moths don’t even have opposable thumbs, so yeah, totally different. The buy-in for the poker tournament near my apartment (Maddie aside, “Is a 40 minute drive considered nearby?”) is $50, which I view as an entertainment cost. That’s only 50 hexagons!
The incentive system has made studying fun. In the last two months I’ve logged 48 hexagons and made significant progress on the first FSA module. The average FSA travel time (3 modules, 3 exams, and 1 nasty seminar) is a 7 year slog. It takes almost forever to finish the certification process but I’d like to pass my exams before other big life events. Hopefully - best case scenario - I lose four poker tournaments in 2023… but also, knock out some modules or exams.
