Let’s be honest, have you ever set an early alarm for yourself with the intention of going on an early morning jog, and instead wound up repeatedly hit the snooze button the next morning? Have you ever lay in bed binge-watching series instead of working through your growing pile of responsibilities? If you answered yes to either of these questions, don’t worry, we have something in common. In fact, most people are prone to this sort of behaviour and procrastination in, favouring instant gratification over long-term benefits.
What is instant gratification?
Instant gratification refers to the desire and action to avoid activities that may lead to future benefits in favour of attaining an immediate benefit that is less rewarding in comparison. This contrasts with delayed gratification, which refers to resisting tempting short-term thrills with the goal of receiving a greater reward in the future. An example of this would be resisting the temptation of sleeping in, and instead using that time to go to the gym, which, if done as a regular practice, will lead to better health and fitness.
Even though the benefits of delayed gratification are greater, many people will still choose the benefits of instant gratification instead, because our brains have been programmed to prioritise short-term success. This has been proven by many studies, including the Marshmallow Experiment. In this study, children were given a marshmallow, and were told that if in five minutes time they hadn’t eaten the marshmallow, they would be given a second one. This would the more desirable option, because even though they must wait, the benefits are greater, thus serving as an example of delayed gratification. However, despite this being a more desirable option, 2/3 children chose to immediately eat the first marshmallow. This shows that people are more likely to choose immediate pleasure over long-term fulfilment.
The dangers of instant gratification
Indulging in instant gratification isn’t necessarily a bad thing, as it’s good to live in the moment and to give yourself time to relax, but an over-indulgence can negatively affect our long-term goals and physical and mental health. For example, seeking short-term thrills constantly isn’t fulfilling in the long-run, and may cause you to lose motivation for achieving your long-term goals, and in serious cases, can lead to problems such as addiction. Thankfully, there are small steps you can take to make delayed gratification easier:
1) See your failures as an opportunity for growth
It’s important to remember that skills and talent aren’t just granted to you at birth, it’s all about practice. If you fail at something, that doesn’t mean that you are destined to be bad at it. All it means is that there is room for you to improve.
2) Make your long-term goals less intimidating by setting milestones
It’s easy to get discouraged by doing activities where we don’t immediately see progress. When you invest a lot of time into a project and see that you’ve only made a small dent in the workload, or if you go to the gym often and don’t see improvement, it can be disheartening. It can also feel incredible intimidating, as more time and effort is needed to achieve your long-term goal of finishing a big project, or of reaching your fitness goal.
What can be very useful in solving this problem is to set yourself a long-term goal and determine the milestones you can reach before the goal. Reaching milestones makes the whole task seem less intimidating and more manageable, and furthermore satisfies the need to see progress before the long-term goal has been reached. This is also a great way to change your mindset from prioritising the outcome, and instead appreciating the effort and the journey.
3) Turn off your cell phone when you want to be productive
I know, I can hear you protesting already, but I promise it helps! Plus, I know that I can’t be the only person who gets mildly horrified about the amount of time that I wasted on my phone when I get my weekly screen-time report. John Davidson goes as far as to call cell phones “immediate-gratification enablers”. In our digital world, we have access to anything we want at the click of a button, whether it be information, entertainment, or online shopping. Thus, the digital sphere is ideal for instant gratification. There are also so many distractions on your phone, it’s the ultimate procrastination tool. Turn off your phone from time-to-time, your future self will thank you.
We all engage in practices of instant gratification, whether it be procrastinating on an assignment by scrolling through social media or staying up late even if we have an early morning ahead of us, it’s important to keep our long-term goals in mind and making sure that they are prioritised over short-term pleasures. While this isn’t always an easy thing to do, it’s not impossible, and there are steps you can take to make these goals easier to achieve, or to change they way in which you view your successes.