Instant Gratification and how it's Affecting us Daily
The subconscious choice you make that falls under the behavior of short-term or long-term orientation
As humans, we’re faced with thousands of choices every day, from making our bed in the morning to deciding where to have lunch and what to do in our free time. We make these decisions by our behavioral orientation and whether we subconsciously favor instant or delayed gratification, which is built based on patterns in our choices and the ways we develop our habitual options.
What is instant gratification?
Instant (or immediate) gratification is typically defined by our temptation or tendency to do something less rewarding to avoid waiting for something more rewarding in the future. For example, deciding to either go through practice questions for an exam and get a good grade or scroll on social media instead because 1) the instant reward is much faster (the dopamine from scrolling) and 2) it’s much easier and faster. It’s like our natural temptation to avoid delay, thus we experience more momentary pleasure than waiting for something more rewarding that would come later.
This comes alongside making decisions like paying for express shipping for a package making it arrive much faster, rather than opting for the free shipping choice and receiving the package much later. This was in fact researched by Chen et al. to a great level of depth, and you can read more here if you’re interested.
How does this relate to my life?
To put it simply think about all the times you’ve had to make a choice and could choose between either the instant reward, versus waiting for something bigger later by choosing something different.
I see this often with driving since when you get a notification on your phone, you immediately want to check it so that your subconscious desire to figure out the mystery of what the message says, rather than waiting to check it at a safer time. It’s the dilemma between instant and delayed gratification that occurs in a split second.
How do I stop letting instant gratification control me?
The most important thing to realize is that you can change this and build a stronger character by first recognizing when you’ve been given the choice. Being conscious of the fact that your decision can give you the outcome of either a short-term or long-term reward can be enough to stop you from doing something that you’ll wish you waited on, like saving up for something valuable instead of impulse-buying something else that doesn’t fulfill you.
Ask yourself what you really want: eg. do I want this necklace just because it’s pretty and cheaper than the others? or should I save up for something much more valuable and long-lasting that I’ve been wanting for longer and I know will fulfill me?
The 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 rule: Mel Robbins has a whole podcast about this, and it comes in handy with things like turning off your alarm in the morning, where you can either a) press snooze and sleep for 9 more minutes, or b) get out of bed, and be on time. Essentially, you just count backward from 5 and the second you’re done, you do the thing you know is better, even though it doesn’t feel like it. In this case, it would be turning off your alarm, getting up, and making your bed because it holds a huge number of benefits, whereas the snooze button shifts your day in the other direction.
The takeaway:
Despite everything above, don’t feel like you need to be the ultimate champion at delayed gratification to live a happy life. There are times when you can do things for instant pleasure and enjoy that moment because sometimes, doing that is better for all of us. When it comes to things like studying vs. procrastinating and making safer decisions while driving, take a moment to consider which path is more important, and then go from there.
Remember, it takes practice and consistency before it becomes a habit.
See you next week :)