OVERCOMING THE CULTURE OF INSTANT GRATIFICATION

Article written and reserched by Zack Mwema

Recently, I had a long chat with a friend, whom I will call Dennis. The topic of discussion was investing for the future and being recently employed,  Dennis told me that he wanted to quit active employment at 40 and then live off his businesses and investments. As we continued to chat along our topic, I noticed that Dennis, like many young people was not willing to save part of his income so that he can invest it for the future. He told me that he wanted to live in the present and wanted all the good things that money can buy now and not tomorrow. He simply wanted instant gratification and could not hear any of my theories on the need to delay his spending so as to enjoy it in the future, what otherwise is referred to as delayed gratification. One of the major reason why majority of people never achieve their financial goals is because of the problem of instant gratification; we want to be financially independent in the future yet we do not want to have the patience to save and invest our income so that we can get it back with better returns tommorow.The culture of instant gratification in modern times is perpertuated by state of the art advertising that makes sure that there is always something that we need every day.

The power of instant gratification

 Let’s consider this passage of the Scripture which I lifted from the book of Genesis chapter 25 from verses 29 up to 34.

“Jacob was boiling lentil stew one day, when Esau came from the field and was faint with hunger. Esau said to Jacob, I beg of you, let me have some of that red lentil stew to eat, for I am faint and famished! .  Jacob answered, then sell me today your birthright (the rights of a firstborn). Esau said, See here, I am at the point of death; what good can this birthright do me? Jacob said, Swear to me today [that you are selling it to me]; and he swore to [Jacob] and sold him his birthright. Then Jacob gave Esau bread and stew of lentils, and he ate and drank and rose up and went his way”

In this passage, we see Esau despising his birthright and selling it for a bowl of lentil stew. He needed food and what mattered to him was getting it right then. Most of us have grown up reading and hearing this story but I don’t know how many of us have ever meditated on it and asked themselves how this “ Esau Instant Gratification “ mentality plays itself in each and every day of our lives. With all the advancement in knowledge, access to education and technology, you would be fooled into thinking that our generation is smarter than Esau’s generation. The truth is, we are not. Here are examples of decisions that we make that will give Essau a run for his wisdom or lack of it…..

a.      We spend all our income and do not save or invest part of it, later on in life we retire or a retrenched, only to find that we need more income in our old age than we currently do.

b.     We live beyond our means; we buy luxury items that we can barely afford from proceeds of loans that we get. This way, we mortgage our future by spending tomorrow’s income today. When you take a loan of say three years in 2015 and spend the proceeds in anything that will not guarantee more income, it means that you are spending your 2016, 2017 and 2018 income today. What will you spend in 2017?

c.      We eat junk food, processed foods and have no time for exercise to keep fit. That way, we sacrifice tomorrow’s health for the pleasures of today.

The list is endless and can go on and on. As renown Leadership expert John Maxwell says, we can either pay the price today and enjoy the benefits later or enjoy the benefits today and pay the price later often with interest. But the price must be paid. Later on in life, Essau paid for the birthright that he had sold to his younger brother. When he learned that Jacob had received the blessing that were reserved for the first born, he cried foul and said that his brother had conned him and wanted to kill him, but wait a moment, hadn’t he sold his birthright to Jacob? The same will apply to those of us who mortgage our futures for the sake of today’s pleasures. A time will come when we will cry foul, blame our Government, our past employers, our wives and even our children for the ills that we will find ourselves in. But the price must be paid and paid in full.

The Power of Delayed Gratification

Let us emancipate ourselves from the chains of instant gratification and instead embrace patience, futuristic thinking. In the 1960s, a Stanford  University professor named Walter Mischel began conducting a series of experiment using children between the ages of  4 to 5. The experiment began by bringing each child into a private room, sitting them down in a chair, and placing a marshmallow on the table in front of them. At this point, the researcher offered a deal to the child. The researcher told the child that he was going to leave the room and that if the child did not eat the marshmallow while he was away, then they would be rewarded with a second marshmallow. However, if the child decided to eat the first one before the researcher came back, then they would not get a second marshmallow.So the choice was simple: one treat right now or two treats later.

The researcher left the room for 15 minutes. As you can imagine, the footage of the children waiting alone in the room was rather entertaining. Some kids jumped up and ate the first marshmallow as soon as the researcher closed the door. Others wiggled and bounced and scooted in their chairs as they tried to restrain themselves, but eventually gave in to temptation a few minutes later. And finally, a few of the children did manage to wait the entire time.

As the years rolled on and the children grew up, the researchers conducted follow up studies and tracked each child’s progress in a number of areas. The children who were willing to delay gratification and waited to receive the second marshmallow ended up having higher exam scores, lower levels of substance abuse, lower likelihood of obesity, better responses to stress, better social skills as reported by their parents, and generally better scores in a range of other life measures…….so the decision is simple my friends, Eat the stew now like Essau and pay the price later with interest or pay the price now like Jacob and enjoy the benefits later

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