Where Have All the Carrots Gone?

In the past, I would have named the following as the carrots that make me work hard:

1. Setting myself up for a life-time of a job where curiosity is the name of the game;
2. Stumbling onto some really cool shit on a daily (ok, more like weekly or monthly) basis;
3. Graduating, and, conversely, starting to make a reasonable amount of money.

So how come I am no longer inclined to name these as carrots?

#1 - I am no longer sure that this one is true; people 10 years senior of me seem to be mainly working their butts off on writing proposals, and hiring grad students and postdocs to do the actual poking around. People 5 years senior of me are either doing poking around for someone else's proposals, or trying to learn how to write their own so their ideas can be explored as well (albeit by someone else).

#2 - Is still true, but I think I may be too underslept/exhausted to fully appreciate this at the moment. (I hope both the sleep situation and my enthusiasm improve soon. Eagerly waiting, actually.)

#3 - Is no longer a carrot, but rather a stick. We find it increasingly difficult to manage on grad student salaries, and need to graduate before we dig ourselves into too deep of a financial hole.

So, currently, there appears to be no carrots, just sticks.

scientiae-carnival