I’ve been reading and discussing a lot about delayed gratification lately – how it’s often hailed as the key to success, the ultimatum of willpower. But I find it true that the core problem is overlooked sometimes. While we are practicing patience, there’s our little sneaky dude at play, making it harder than it should be.
So let’s talk about our brain’s little standup show with “Dopamine” .
We recently sifted through application for our NGSF internship program – hundreds of them, eager to be embark on their scientific journey. I couldn’t help but notice something odd – 1 in 3 applicants didn’t submit a mandatory document that we needed to evaluate them. But these were the applicants that had amazing CVs and stories to tell in their SOPs.
So, is this a big deal ? Indeed yes, I look at it as a glaring lack of attention to detail. Seeing amazing students missing out important documents was pretty jarring. I’ve also come across PIs stating the rejections of PhD candidates, which I believe is not only because of carelessness.
I have been noticing a decline in the attention span among peers of which i am not an exemption. Fueled by all that instant gratification – Cheap domaine. This gets me to think about delayed gratification or a lack of it. Quick effort rewards are everywhere like instagram reels and TikTok but slogging through a long list of application requirements is not exactly a thrill to be honest. So its not hard to see why some people give attention and others skip it altogether.
Dr.Anna Lembke in her book ‘dopamine nation’ discussed how our brain is wired to chase pleasure and how it’s swinging in loop of dopamine striking distractions. And I could instantly relate to it and understand why it is tougher to stick together with things that doesn’t deliver the reward right away – like filling out super long applications with details.
Then there’s Andrew Huberman , who in his podcast discusses essential tools that we could use to master control release of dopamine. He also talks about neuroadaptation, where our brains get so used to frequent, intense stimlui that we need more to get the same kick.
Here’s a breakdown of how I plan to break the dopamine trap .
Brace yourself, more brain fuel coming!
References:
- Dopamine Nation by Dr. Anna Lembke
- Andrew Huberman’s podcast “How to Increase Motivation & Drive” & “Controlling your brain for Motivation, Focus and satisfaction”
- The Mountain Is You by Brianna Wiest
- Mark Manson on Delayed Gratification
Scholarscape 