…and it causes MANY problems and MUCH anxiety in my life.
This is why I struggle with things like natural medications and therapies that don’t produce instant results.
This is why I can’t seem to get my house in order.
Or my finances.
Or my career.
This is why I struggle within certain relationships.
Instant gratification can make me a VERY complex individual. I actually think I may need therapy (do you know how BIG it is for me to even admit that I may need some therapy? – I don’t like talking to strangers about my not-so-nice traits) because at this stage in my life I should surely have some coping mechanisms in place? Gosh. How is it that I am STILL struggling with this? Should I not have grown into it or something by now?
Now I know that we all have degrees of instant gratification and now now now stuff happening in our brains.
I promise you, where you have the B-degree in Instant Gratification I have the PhD. THAT’s how bad it is with me. I am all about simpler, better, faster, MORE. NOW. THIS INSTANT. IMMEDIATELY.
I am currently in a few situations that require me to wait it out. To stop. To think. To be patient. To listen. To learn. To hang in there. To focus on the bigger picture.
I am BATTLING. I feel like I’m being asked to walk on upright nails or something.
And quite frankly, I don’t like this part of myself. AT ALL.
Child1 is VERY instant gratification. I had always assumed that it was related to his ADHD and it is. The fact that I’m not a very good example to him where this is concerned makes it soooo much worse.
So I basically have to teach myself how to delay gratification AND I need to help him to work on his instant gratification issues.
But where to start? How does one even begin to learn delayed gratification?
Gosh. I am just so annoyed with myself right now.
And btw…I don’t come from a home where instant gratification was tolerated. It drove me NUTS!
I am all about instant gratification Julia!!!! Honestly I think it is one of the reasons the shop didn’t really work – I am actually working through it in our couples therapy sessions!!
It is an Aries trait and my daughter has it too.
I set goals for what I needs to be done now and what can wait – it doesn’t always work but I do get encouraged when one thing gets done.
Funny that you should write about this when I’ve just read a blog post about delay – http://www.kclanderson.com/wait.
As for not having things figured out at our age – I think this is normal. There will always be something to learn. We have to evolve.
Trust me, I am exactly the same as you are! It was one of the hardest things to deal with when it came to my infertility. Because I simply couldn’t have what I wanted when I wanted it. It’s an issue I struggle with daily and is the main reason why I’m always broke, in spite of earning a good salary, the biggest impact of my instant gratification is that I am a shop-a-holic! When I see something and I want it, I cannot wait till pay day or assess my cash flow, I will buy it because I-MUST-HAVE-IT-NOW!
I also battle with it at home because if I want something done, I want it done NOW! I hate it when I get a good idea because I know it’s going to get me into trouble because there will be no waiting for the right time, I’ll act on it immediately and often with disastrous consequences!
Instant gratification!!!! Have a piece of meat now or wait an hour and have more!!! Battle of will!!!
TOUGH! TOUGH!! TOUGH!!!
I think it is something you can learn…but the learning isn’t fun. We all have a bit of it like you said. What about making the delayed reward bigger than the instant one?
I used to be an instant gratification kinda girl – but 7 years of infertility have taught me a small notion of delayed gratification and I know am like this in my life as well… if there is something I want I sit on it and sit on it (often too long and then it passes me by but that’s not always a bad thing {my kindle being one of these such things I’m sitting on})
xxx
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