10 years ago, my dad died of a sudden heart attack. My mom and I both love a salty snack that combines multiple components: chips, pretzels, and Cheezies. We both love the Cheezies most. While we were bonding over our shared love of this snack, my mom said "Do you save the Cheezies for last like I do?" and I replied, "Heck no. If there's one thing I learned from Dad's death it's that we could go at any time. I'm not going to be the sucker who dies after only eating the pretzels."
I was mostly joking (but not fully), but I think it's true. Delayed gratification has its place when there's something better, more meaningful coming along. But we're not guaranteed it, and sometimes it's better to eat the Cheezies (or the marshmallows).
Thank you for your most recent post. First of all to say, grief is sh*t, it can be brutal, unsettling, discombobulating and leave you feeling adrift and uncertain. It is also not time bound; it takes as long as it takes and is different for everyone. I know you know this.
As to the delayed gratification, bearing in mind that the original study was conducted at Stanford in the 1960s, when the world was a different place. Plus, the research proposal would probably be unlikely to pass an ethics committee review today. The concept of delayed gratification reminds me of how Catholic women, and men, but particularly women, were encouraged to put up with much distress in life, distress that included misogyny, so they could ‘get their reward in heaven’. And look how that turned out!
Meditation teaches us to live in the moment, so is eating the marshmallow just enjoying the moment of pleasure?
Psychology says that delayed gratification is key to achieving a successful future, whatever that is. How to define success? And does it not lead to the striving for a better future, at which we never arrive, because there is always a better one to strive for? Must we always be speeding towards a better future? Just because life is to be lived, does it mean it has to be lived at breakneck speed?
I think delayed gratification is overrated. Sometimes it is right to just eat the marshmallow.
I learned of a friend's death this week. It has impacted me in surprising ways, not least the thought of the 29 days between his diagnosis and death, and the futility of holding off on eating the marshmallows in such circumstances.
It's easy to conclude that the uncertainty of life is a reason for never slowing down but I argue strongly that the opposite is true. I hear that in the few days he was able to go home from hospital in those final weeks he spent time reading, watching films, and playing with his cats.
I suspect that if we were offered the opportunity to look back on life at the point of its ending, most of us would regard these small pleasures as the real marshmallows, and that they'd been more plentiful and good for us than we'd realised all along.
This is an amazing piece of writing. Thank you.
Thanks, Laura 🥰
10 years ago, my dad died of a sudden heart attack. My mom and I both love a salty snack that combines multiple components: chips, pretzels, and Cheezies. We both love the Cheezies most. While we were bonding over our shared love of this snack, my mom said "Do you save the Cheezies for last like I do?" and I replied, "Heck no. If there's one thing I learned from Dad's death it's that we could go at any time. I'm not going to be the sucker who dies after only eating the pretzels."
I was mostly joking (but not fully), but I think it's true. Delayed gratification has its place when there's something better, more meaningful coming along. But we're not guaranteed it, and sometimes it's better to eat the Cheezies (or the marshmallows).
Thank you for your most recent post. First of all to say, grief is sh*t, it can be brutal, unsettling, discombobulating and leave you feeling adrift and uncertain. It is also not time bound; it takes as long as it takes and is different for everyone. I know you know this.
As to the delayed gratification, bearing in mind that the original study was conducted at Stanford in the 1960s, when the world was a different place. Plus, the research proposal would probably be unlikely to pass an ethics committee review today. The concept of delayed gratification reminds me of how Catholic women, and men, but particularly women, were encouraged to put up with much distress in life, distress that included misogyny, so they could ‘get their reward in heaven’. And look how that turned out!
Meditation teaches us to live in the moment, so is eating the marshmallow just enjoying the moment of pleasure?
Psychology says that delayed gratification is key to achieving a successful future, whatever that is. How to define success? And does it not lead to the striving for a better future, at which we never arrive, because there is always a better one to strive for? Must we always be speeding towards a better future? Just because life is to be lived, does it mean it has to be lived at breakneck speed?
I think delayed gratification is overrated. Sometimes it is right to just eat the marshmallow.
I learned of a friend's death this week. It has impacted me in surprising ways, not least the thought of the 29 days between his diagnosis and death, and the futility of holding off on eating the marshmallows in such circumstances.
It's easy to conclude that the uncertainty of life is a reason for never slowing down but I argue strongly that the opposite is true. I hear that in the few days he was able to go home from hospital in those final weeks he spent time reading, watching films, and playing with his cats.
I suspect that if we were offered the opportunity to look back on life at the point of its ending, most of us would regard these small pleasures as the real marshmallows, and that they'd been more plentiful and good for us than we'd realised all along.