Instant Gratification and Technology.

This is not a reflection, but this is something I thought about recently that I want to share with the class.

I was thinking about this after talking with my therapist about instant gratification. It seems like more and more, Technology is offering us faster and faster methods of getting what we want now. For example, phones are becoming more and more a 'do-everything' device. You can surf the web, listen to music, play games, etc., etc.

The problem lies within the fact that everything becomes accessible to us with such ease that, since we can get it now, that everything else should come now, instead of later. We lose true freedom this way as we get addicted to everything that we want, now. Real freedom is controlling what we want, and when we want it. Not just an impulse of 'now.'

Just think of certain things that are not good for people that could be easily accessed without blocks or tracking via instant technology--there are quite a few.

However, virtues and morals teach us something important: patience, and putting off instant gratification. Instead of getting it now, you wait. The reward and the feeling of getting something that you've patiently waited for is much more invigorating and satisfying than getting it immediately.

Good things come to those who wait, those who take the time to work at it, not to those who will give up if they can't get it now, or get angry when they can't get it now. Imagine all the authors in world, and what if they had focused on instant gratification instead of being patient in writing their books. If so, we wouldn't have very good books.

We're growing in a society that constantly teaching us that "now" is better than "later." Sometimes, this is the case. However, is this always the case? Is it necessary? I say 'no.' Especially since instant gratification has taken a bit of a toll on my own life. I think it also has probably taken other lives as well.

Perhaps the world needs a wake-up call before it's too late.