A common trait highly successful people exhibit is their ability to delay gratification. They have a long-term future focus. We all know patience is a virtue. Most of us know in the back of our mind we ought to think long term.
We want everything now
Yet, we favour choices that bring us instant gratification over delayed gratification. We live in a culture where we expect to get everything we want instantly and we want it now! We’ve all grown accustomed to favour the present and care less about the future. While living in the moment and experiencing things in the now has benefits, we also need to account for the future.
According to Sigmund Freud, the mind tends to seek pleasure and avoid pain to satisfy biological and psychological needs. You might notice children’s behavior to seek pleasure in satisfying their cravings of hunger and thirst or whatever they want in the moment. As a child matures to become an adult, he is able to think ahead and delay gratification.
The Marshmallow Experiment
In the late 1960s, researchers at Stanford university conducted a series of study on delayed gratification, known as the “Marshmallow Experiment.” They gave children the option to have one marshmallow now or delay getting a marshmallow for a period of time and then get two marshmallows instead. The researchers tracked the children more than 10 years later. The children who were able to wait longer for the preferred rewards performed better in health and fitness, academic achievements and financial performance.
What can we learn from Amazon’s success?
Every successful person has mastered the ability to delay gratification. If there’s someone we could learn from, it has to be Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon. Bezos constantly stresses the importance of long-term thinking. He grew amazon from a small online bookstore to an industry giant.
The overnight success took many years of perseverance. Amazon was chronically unprofitable for many years. In the early years of Amazon, many people argued that perhaps the company was fundamentally broken, that it would never be profitable and would fail. Most people were impatient, short-sighted and concerned about short-term gains. They misunderstood Bezos who remained steadfast in his grand plan committed to long-term investment and value creation. We see the philosophy of Bezos in the motto of Blue Origin, the space exploration company he founded: “Gradatim Ferociter,” meaning “Step by Step ferociously” in English.
This is what Jeff Bezos said about focusing in the long-term: “If everything you do needs to work on a three-year time horizon, then you’re competing against a lot of people, But if you’re willing to invest on a seven-year time horizon, you’re now competing against a fraction of those people, because very few companies are willing to do that. Just by lengthening the time horizon, you can engage in endeavours that you could never otherwise pursue. At Amazon we like things to work in five to seven years. We’re willing to plant seeds, let them grow—and we’re very stubborn. We say we’re stubborn on vision and flexible on details.”Â
Buying a car for the first time
When I decided to buy my first car, I had the choice to purchase a brand-new car or a used car. A car is a liability that comes with regular expenses: new tires, repair, gas, car insurance and so on. A brand new car is an even bigger liability as the expenses are higher. In 5 years, a brand-new car loses 60% of its initial value of what you bought it for. I could have easily borrowed money to buy a new expensive car. There is nothing wrong with buying a new car.
Did I want a brand-new car? somewhat
Did I need one? NO, I needed a vehicle to take me from point A to B.
So I decided to buy a used car because I didn’t need a brand new. In my case buying a used car was the right long-term decision. This stopped me from borrowing money to buy a liability that immediately goes down in value. Delaying short term gratification enabled me to be debt free and focus on long term investment.
Easy vs hard choice
Pursuing the easy route by satisfying immediate urges and cravings may seem to be a good choice in the moment. In the beginning, you don’t feel any pain and you get instant gratification.If we treat life as a series of short term, the pain will start to accumulate over time, growing every day that passes by.We are witnessing an epidemic of obesity in the Western world. Lifestyle choices play a vital part in our health.
Most people don’t exercise and see it as a chore. It’s easier to be sedentary as this choice involves less effort. Let’s consider the following choices:
A- sit on the sofa and watch Netflix
B- going to the gym
Which option did you choose?
Option A is more appealing because the person avoids the pain of working out at the gym and satisfies their pleasure of watching Netflix.
Option B seems to be more difficult. It’s easier to choose A over B. Given the choice, most people will prefer to avoid pain and seek pleasure. Sacrificing long term health for short term gain has become a norm in our culture.
Conclusion
Delaying gratification is a route paved with discomfort. You might have to go through pain in the beginning. However, the pain decreases over time and you are rewarded in the long run. Your ability to delay gratification impacts upon your health, happiness and success.
It might be useful to ask yourself this question when you make a choice: How will it impact me in 5 years?
