Remember that Stanford experiment where they put a bunch of preschoolers in front of a marshmallow and correlated the kids who didn't eat it right away with better financial success in life?
I really didn't want to be the kid who ate the marshmallow right away.
Admittedly my description of the study is a little hyperbolic but at the time I took this correlation very seriously and without any nuance. I ignored the obvious fact that this is a silly way of predicting future success and started rejecting pillowy puffs of sugar as part of my identity. I was someone who didn't need gratification until I got what I wanted, and I clung to this ideal of myself for over a decade.
Not rewarding myself until I accomplished my goals worked fine when it came to schooling through undergrad. I didn't have to try at anything continuously for over 4 months straight, and I was sheepishly proud that I limited time spent socializing, finding hobbies, or developing meaningful friendships. I thought I was shunning fun in the name of realizing a financially successful, entirely independent future self and I willfully ignored the reality these actions were creating for me: A person whose self-identity was entirely defined by work. I would lose my sense of self if I subsequently burned out, all the while being completely alone because I shunned the only people who might sympathize and care early on.
I know what I'm describing - don’t make work your entire identity - is obvious, but when societal norms unabashedly award excessive ambition it can be hard to unlearn work habits that feel like the bare minimum. Here and there I would stumble across a couple red flags warning me against taking an all-out approach to accomplishing any goal, but I would be incapable of realizing what the true problem was. I always blamed failures on my wretched weakness for gratification. When I started a small diet at 12 I told myself I would never eat ice cream until I had reached my target weight. Hilariously, I couldn't figure out for 9 years why I would predictably eat one pint in a sitting on a regular basis after having sworn it off. I truly thought I was just broken.
It's been a year since I left school. I've finally failed enough at any goal with a time horizon over 6 months to realize I've misunderstood the concept of instant gratification my whole life. I thought I was being short-sighted if I took a break when I was highly stressed, if I didn't put my 110% effort into everything I did, or if I stopped working long hours because I was exhausted. Then I burned out and nearly stopped being able to work altogether. I had to learn that instant gratification for me was being able to tell people that I was super busy. Being able to feel that no matter what, at least I was the one who was focused and put in the the longest hours. I don't know what I planned to get with my delayed gratification- Perhaps it was to demonstrate that I worked the hardest until everyone accepted it and I could finally take a break.
It shows in the fact I've never been able to do anything consistently, including activities I really enjoy such as writing and going to the gym. If you saw me at a New Year's Party any year between 2015 and the year Kylie tweeted Snap was no longer cool, you'd hear me swear "This is the year I'm gonna have a Snap streak longer than 30 days." I thought my inability to commit to something was almost cute. When I failed every year, I shed few tears announcing "I just have a really short attention span.”
I will no longer ignore the value of putting in what you can every single day for years. Sometimes your best has to be just average, and you’re progressing if you can move your average day toward your best. Anybody can start a project and put everything they've got into it hoping it turns into a habit. Unspeakably difficult is admitting to the slower clip you need to move at in order to be the one who survives the longest. There definitely isn't a perfect solution- The world has deadlines, other people who have different priorities from you, and standards you can't personally conform to. I'm simply going to make longevity my primary goal in every priority I choose and be cognizant of patterns that are unsustainable. Maybe one day I'll be able to work at a pace where I don't feel completely exhausted in 6 month's time. That’s not today, but when I do get there, I’ll be immensely proud that I delayed gratification.
> Sometimes your best has to be just average
My favourite takeaway from this post!