Retrospect
Retrospect
Living In The Age Of Instant Everything | Retrospect Ep.201
In this week’s episode we discussed how the rise of instant gratification is reshaping our habits, expectations, and even our mental health. Is convenience coming at a cost? We unpack the impact of living in an always-on, right-now culture. From same-day delivery to instant messages and on-demand entertainment, our world moves faster than ever before.
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Retrospect
Jason 0:01
Single tap, a tiny chunky and there it is, your craving delivered, but the magic has a price. Every rush rewires the human brain. Every click teaches us to knead it faster and somewhere in the blur, patience dies. We live in a world where waiting has become an endangered species, a package that used to take a week now arrives in hours, a movie that once meant a trip to the theater now streams with a single click. We can summon food, a ride, even a date faster than it takes to boil water, and it feels good that little rush when the Buy Now button turns into a tracking number. It's not magic, it's dopamine, and the more we get, the more we want. But here's the question, Is the world moving faster, or are we just losing muscle to wait. What happens to patients in a society addicted to speed today, we are diving deep into the phenomena of instant gratification, how it's shaping our minds, our habits and maybe even our future. Buckle up in the next hour, we might just find that the hardest thing to wait for is learning how to wait at all. Welcome to the retrospect
Ian 1:37
podcast, a show where people come together from different walks of life and discuss a topic from the generations perspective. My name is Ian, and as always, I'm joined by Jason, hello, everyone. And Stoney, Hello, how's it
Jason 1:47
going? Oh, we're doing good. Yeah, good. Oh, yeah. Can't complain.
Ian 1:53
The summer is coming to a close. Everyone's getting well
Stoney 1:56
started again. And lovely school busses and oh goodness, school traffic, and our patience gets worn to a and it
Ian 2:05
doesn't help that our area is doing a lot of like, construction. I feel like in three
Stoney 2:09
major three of the four major roads have construction on them for us.
Jason 2:14
Yeah, I wonder who made that decision.
Ian 2:16
I hope, I've hoped that they were going to finish that before school started, but
Stoney 2:22
that should have been written into the contract the day school ended. They should have started the construction, not waiting a couple of weeks and said you must be finished seven days before school starts or you're not getting paid. Well, that's not what happened, and that's not this area because of the corruption and everything else and mismanagement of the area that we live in, yes. So I would love to do a show on that one, but I know we won't bring it that close to home, but one day.
Ian 2:52
Yeah. But anyways, that's been, that's been a fun thing, because I've been trying to avoid all the strategically taking detours work. So it's been,
Jason 3:01
yeah, we've, we've got, it seems like we just have problems when it comes to road work. Oh goodness, in this area, I don't know what it is. It's just, you know, maybe we live in a bubble here. I don't know. Maybe we're not maybe they have these problems elsewhere. But
Ian 3:21
I think it, and I think some of the problem too, is we have a lot of a lot of like, like, one main road that, like that is, like, the is the path most traveled, because it's the quickest path, and so it gets tore up because it's being used very frequently. And then to, like, do a major repair, like we're talking about right now, it takes you shutting the whole road down, but like, people are like, I'm not taking a 15 minute detour around just to get home. And that's the, that's where I think a lot of the frustration at least around in
Jason 3:52
my we don't have, there's not a lot of alternate routes. As
Ian 3:56
I'm saying, it's like, so when you when you want to remodel your whole road, you have to
Stoney 4:00
like it. Yeah, try doing three at the same time. Yeah, it's crazy. So it's 15 minute alternate route. Oh, gosh, are also being
Ian 4:08
correct
Jason 4:09
Exactly? Yeah, it's just we're
Ian 4:11
gonna get there. It's gonna take a while.
Stoney 4:13
People are never happy, and they're happy that the roads are worn out, and then they're not happy when they decide to fix them. Yep, you
Jason 4:21
can't please. When did we ever get so impatient? I
Ian 4:25
was going to say this, it feels very apt to what we're talking about today. What a nice segue. Jason,
Jason 4:30
yeah. When did we get him? When did we get impatient? Because you would think at one time that people were not this
Stoney 4:38
impatience was a virtue that was celebrated and taught patience is in the Bible, in religious texts, Proverbs, family traditions, you know, waiting was woven into the fabric of life. You had to wait for the harvest, right? If you were a farmer, you had to wait for the. Prime hunting season or fishing season, if you were a fisher or Hunter, and then you had to wait for a letter. That's right, you know, somebody sent the letter. You know, 102 to 300 years ago, the man might leave for two or three years to go on a sailing vessel, to go do something. The woman was home taking care of the farm and everything. That's when love letters you were writing, 15 to 20 page love letters, right? That may take months to get back to your wife or your husband, and that's what you lived on. You lived on that love letter. We've even lost that ability just to write an
Jason 5:36
outstanding lovely people can't write like that anymore. You know, we waited
Stoney 5:40
for paychecks. I don't know, I don't know if Ian will remember this, but you might, do you remember lay away? Oh yeah. Remember lay away? Yeah, you go to Kmart. Or
Jason 5:52
to me, I was a precursor to basically, people using credit cards. Oh yeah. It was just another way of doing it. Put a
Stoney 6:00
little down payment, right? And two or three payments over, and then you got your Christmas stuff. That's right, a layaway was just part of life, part of the everyday culture of America. Well,
Jason 6:12
it was about necessity. I mean, as I said, I mean, it's, I mean, we just didn't have the technology. We didn't have the, what I'd call the technological infrastructure in place to be able to do what we do now, yeah, for good or bad, but yeah, I mean, where
Stoney 6:30
it was a virtue, now it's seen as an inefficiency or a weakness to be patient or to have to be patient on something
Jason 6:39
well, you know, I had this discussion about why we're always rushing. And I don't know, I think it was at work, we were having this discussion regarding why people are show up late, or they always seem to be in a rush. And just kind of the conversation comes around. It's like, How engaged are you with what you're doing, as far as where you're going? And my premise was, I feel like most people are very unhappy what they do, not we've talked about, right? Not, not overtly, just there's a lack of joy in their life, what they do, of what they say or right? So if you feel like all you're doing is going through the motions, you can apply that to anything in life. If all that I'm doing is checking the box, you know there's going to be a lack of urgency to to so you're going to push that envelope as as far as you can. And and then when you get out there and everybody else is leaving at the same time, oh yeah, traffic is bad, and it just people just like, get frustrated again. I mean, I sometimes happens to me, it's like, you know, I gotta check myself at times.
Stoney 7:53
Well, today, it's funny. Ian brought up this. I had, I have to go to physical therapy twice a week. One, the physical therapy place that I go is on a road that's one of those two roads that tease in together, that's under construction, with a third road just being off of those two roads that connect, right? And so when I got to the physical therapy place today, nobody was there. Oh, everybody was late, yeah, and so I was there early. But what would normally take seven minutes for me to get from my house to physical therapy took me 42 minutes get out. Luckily, I believe in being somewhere 30 minutes early. I live in the world of if you're not 15 minutes early, you're late, right? And so one of the physical therapy technicians and I were talking while he was kind of working me through this, and he said, we're so sorry that we were late, because I'm normally their first customer, so to speak. And I was like, Well, why do y'all Why do you not allow enough time? And he says, What are you talking about? I says, y'all pull up and you see me still sitting there. You're the employees y'all work here. You see me sitting in that parking lot? Yeah, we've, we've wondered about that. And I says, I'm there 15 to 30 minutes early. And I said, and as the employees or the managers or whatever, Why don't y'all do that? And he says, I don't understand. I said, think about this. You get here one to two minutes before you're supposed to punch the clock. What's your mindset? Oh my god. I have to get in. I have to punch in in time. Oh my, I have to do this. I gotta make the coffee. I gotta do this. I have to do that. Oh, I need to do the plan. Who am I seeing first? That's how your whole day goes. Yeah, if you start off hectic, your whole mentality for the day is now going to be hectic, I said, but what happens tomorrow? Tomorrow, if you allot enough time to get here 15 to 30 minutes early, I used to read the newspaper and drink a cup of coffee and smoke a cigar. I would, you know, when I had to go to work or whatever I was doing, I have time to woo saw, so to speak, right? I relax. I take a break. I think about, oh, what's my day gonna have? Oh, you know what I need? Oh, you know, I forgot. I needed to get that piece of paper, or I needed to fill up my paper clips, or let me go make a pot of coffee. And he was like, I've never thought of it like that. Now he's in his 20s, young, you know, young to mid 20s. So he what would that generation be? Gen Z? Gen Z? I think Gen Z. And he said, I've never thought of it like that. And I says, I like to start my day off in a positive way. I don't want to be hectic all day, right? But y'all are into this instant gratification thing where everything's got to happen now you get there just in time to do this because you were Doom scrolling on your phone, right?
Ian 11:03
Probably, but then, but I think it also goes into kind of what, some of what Jason is saying as well, where it's, like, I'm not saying he's not happy with his job, but like, I have gotten honestly, complacent. I've gotten in, like, the monotony of, like, you know, day to day work, and it gets to a point where, like, Yes, I do love what I'm doing, but, like, necessarily, right now, I don't want to go into work on a Tuesday morning or whatever. It's hard for me to want to leave the house super
Jason 11:28
early, because you don't really want to be no Exactly. That's
Ian 11:31
just because I because I know, and the hard part is, for like, the kind of work I do in, like, an office building, I know there's going to probably be, there be some people there a few minutes early, like you were saying. So like, if I show up 30 minutes early, which sometimes I do, I know that, like, even though I'm not supposed to really start until eight o'clock, let's say hypothetically, if I show up at 730 like, I know there's going to be some people in the front office that are going to be like, hey, come do this thing. Hey, come to and like, sometimes I'll be like, let me, let's wait. Yeah, but sometimes it's hard because, like, if I get there early, I'm going to be starting work early, and it's like, gosh, I don't
Jason 12:02
right. I think if you worked in an environment where you were allowed that it doesn't start till Right, right, right until the clock clicks.
Stoney 12:14
Oh, that's also setting boundaries, right? Very good. Setting boundaries. Hey, I'll be back a few minutes before eight o'clock, and we'll take care of that, right? I have a couple of things I want to do. I got to make my coffee, and you do that one time. That'll be the last time they ask you to do that again, if you do it in a correct fashion. This is still my time. I'm preparing for my day. I'll get with you. You'll be the first one I get to. And I just believe in boundaries myself. Well,
Ian 12:41
then some jobs allow Jason and I
Stoney 12:43
have worked together, correct?
Jason 12:46
Some jobs do allow that. Others don't. Yes, the minute you show up, you're it's kind of like, okay, you're here so you don't really
Ian 12:54
have I've worked, I've worked at, like, shift work type jobs, like in service industry stuff, and I'm not, technically not supposed to clock in five minutes earlier on my shift, but I've showed up 10 to 15 minutes early. And a lot of times, like I have always been asked to clock in early, and a lot of times, sometimes I have, you know, denied that. But then sometimes, if it's from but if it's from a management position, sometimes I've gotten upset because I'm now sitting in the background
Stoney 13:24
doing service industry would be hard because you don't have your own office. You don't have your own but in the job you have now, you have your own office, you can say, I'll be back with you, right?
Jason 13:33
I think if you have your own office, I think it does grant you, it kind of insulates you a little bit from that. But if you don't, you're just kind of out in the open, yeah, sometimes
Ian 13:44
that's my fair game. Some of that I do, I do think you're correct, though. Some people scroll on their phone too much in the mornings. I have been guilty of like, you know, keeping busy around the house before, because I'm kind of putting off and procrastinating, like, going into work. So there's a whole bunch of things I need to
Jason 13:59
play into fight it every morning, because I had a taste of being at home and not rushing in the morning.
Stoney 14:07
And what was that episode? We did something about busy. What was the title? Well, you because you wasted 15 minutes or half hour Doom scrolling, yeah, now you're behind schedule.
Ian 14:19
Yeah. I think, I think that more so, or at least for me, at least played into the fact for me, that whole discussion came out of a place of like, I I like being busy, and I think sometimes I think people in their life also will keep claiming to be busy. Because I think America has a culture and a society of like, if you're if you're not busy, you're lazy, is what it feels Sure, if you're not working, if you're not grinding, then grinding, then you're not like being productive. That's a cultural thing, and that's I'm saying it may not be that
Stoney 14:47
we're talking about today is instant gratification, and because I have to have that instant Doom scrolling and things like that, what if you turned it into like a little reward? What? If you get to your job 15 minutes to 30 minutes early, and you look forward to that Doom scrolling as a reward right now, does it mean a little bit more to you? And so you look forward to doing something so you hate your job and you're not really into your job. But hey, you know what? If I get to work 30 minutes early, I can sit in the car, or there's a little convenience store around the corner. I don't have to be in the parking lot or in there. I'm just there, right? If a train comes and blocks the tracks, I know I'm on time, right? So you give yourself these little rewards throughout the day that's called self care, no doubt. Okay, so you just change and the now the Doom scrolling, does it now have a little bit more significant value, other than just a dopamine rush for I got something instantaneous.
Jason 15:52
I'm gonna tell you what. I've got some interesting statistics on your statistics on on some of this stuff regarding just how powerful of a dopamine hit this is, Oh, yeah. I mean, it's especially the shopping some of this stuff is, yes, quite
Stoney 16:07
incredible they have, and I had some stuff I didn't know we were going that direction on it. I wish I'd have brought it now. But electronics addiction has the same things as a heroin addiction. Yeah, 100% same receptors, receptors, everything. So when we're looking at this instant gratification of, I've got to have it now. I've got to have this. I got to have that. It all plays into this dopamine addiction thing. I
Jason 16:33
mean, I've got some stuff here in patients, among millennials, and they say in a survey of nearly 3000 US adults, 45% of millennials reported that technology has made them more impatient compared to five years
Stoney 16:52
ago. They don't have to wait on anything. No, it's a habit
Jason 16:55
now. They said, talk about electronics. I found this pretty interesting. 55% of web pages were viewed, viewed received less than 15 seconds of attention. Interesting. 47% of users expect a website to load in two seconds or less, and 40% abandon a website if it takes longer than three seconds, and they say is a 17% of web page views lasted under four seconds, while only 4% lasted more than 10 minutes. So it kind of, kind of goes to show you, man, you got a web page, you better make sure it's it holds people's attention, because it's like, Look gone.
Stoney 17:42
From a historical perspective, boomers had handwritten letters. Delayed gratification and anticipation was part of the experience. Gen Z, okay. They're starting to change a couple of things. They've got fax machines, instant ramen and MTV, the early taste of the, you know, the instant culture. And then Millennials had the rise of the Internet, Napster and iTunes for instant music and text messaging and Gen Z and alpha. Their entire lives are lived with instant streaming food delivery apps and real time news and AI. So they are completely born into the instant life
Jason 18:29
that's well, we are we are now. We're completely knee deep in it now, yeah, this is the what I was trying to tell you all about here. It said in a recent study, among 205 German participants checking social media, 65% and email, 71% ranked among desires harder to resist than even food or sex. Wow. That's Wow. Okay, resisting Facebook specifically failed 42% of the time, far higher than failing to resist sex, which was a success rate of 90% really, it's easier to resist sex interest than it is to resist looking at Facebook.
Ian 19:24
Wow, that just goes to show how much that you the
Jason 19:29
mental aspect of this technology.
Stoney 19:33
Well, you can see the difference in there. When you're looking at Facebook, it's then instantaneous. Sex could take, like you said on the website, it could take two or three minutes for most guys. So it's the gratification. But I still
Ian 19:46
think like that. I still think it's something to do with things playing in your head, the fact that, like all these different social media platforms have these curated algorithms, have had and know exactly how to like. Not only get your attention, but keep your attention, and keep you looking and keep use. That's, that's, I think, I think playing into some of that, yeah, nowadays, adjusting the instant stuff. I think it's also some very deep psychological stuff they have manufactured
Stoney 20:13
that whole two, three minutes. I got
Jason 20:15
it. I knew exactly what wow I was I knew exactly what you were saying. I'm just trying to, I'm just trying to get that rabbit hole. I'm so fast. That might be a topic for another podcast.
Ian 20:30
Oh, my God. It just it that's, that's what surprises me more, is it some like, deep down, primal like, something that I feel like, even probably 1015, years ago, would that statistic would look very different. You know, I'm saying, like, that's such a core thing of humanity that, like, they have engineered this thing so well, yes, that it can bypass all of the it could bypass, like, like I was saying, the urge to eat and, like, all all these other different like human instincts that are like man. That's crazy to think
Jason 21:03
about. It said in a 2012 study, found that over 70% of teachers believe media use has harmed students attention spans, yes, and 40% said it negatively impacted critical thinking. Games and texting were the most cited. They said, additionally, more than 1/3 of US workers reported needing to stay connected to work during vacations, with 89% checking email and 70% making work related calls. Wow.
Stoney 21:38
You know, I know I pick on y'all about missing my little joke there. But I told a joke on a Zoom meeting the other day. Apparently I'm not even remotely funny.
Jason 21:47
What you mean? Why is that remote? Remote? Oh, God, remotely funny. Stoney is always throwing something out there like, Oh, come on. He's on a roll right now. He is on a roll.
Ian 21:59
The heck I don't know about that. I think it's more so the fact that I'm just not aware. Right now, that's funny, though that's great.
Stoney 22:07
Yeah, look, this is my best.
Ian 22:11
What is the old phrase pearls amongst swine?
Jason 22:16
Oh man, is a marketers capitalize on users impatience. 55% of consumers stick to two to three trusted sites for content and purchases. 41% feel overwhelmed by choices online, and 26% struggle to find what they're looking for amid information overload.
Ian 22:37
Interesting,
Jason 22:38
yeah, and here's some, just some some quotes from some Reddit users here. Okay, I found interesting. That's scary. Giving these quick shots of dopamine over and over, and you're you're addicted to things being quick and easy. And another said, instant gratification often comes with a cost. Credit card debt, you pay for it 10 fold in interest and stress.
Ian 23:02
That's a good point. Yeah, something I haven't thought about, that's a, that's exactly what a credit card is a lot of times. Yeah, I mean, well,
Stoney 23:10
you know, one of the early, um,
Ian 23:12
I say that. I said it because I'm guilty. Like, there's been a handful of times I don't, I don't quite have the full amount of money. But, like, what I I really would like to have this new piece of equipment. I was one of
Stoney 23:22
the first solutions to credit card debt. I don't know. One of the first solutions was to take your credit card and fill up an ice cream bucket, half of ice, put the card in it and fill up the rest of it to prevent them, to prevent you from instantaneously just grabbing it and going you had to wait for the ice to melt right and then get our chip it, which you didn't want to do, because you didn't want to break the card and then make that decision. So it forced you to be patient, in a way that was one of the early credit card
Jason 23:56
Yeah. Now, now everything is linked to your account right there,
Ian 24:02
but now you have NFC on your phone. Yeah, tap your phone and that's
Jason 24:05
it. I mean, it's there's not much, you know, to prevent people from unless you just have,
Stoney 24:11
I love you said that. You said that with the phone. What you used to have, you took a picture, and then you had to take it to the drugstore and Ha, and wait two or three days for them to develop it. Now, you just take the picture with your phone, yep, and it's just, boom, there it is, and post it.
Ian 24:30
Some of it, some of these things, I think are interesting, like, really cool stuff in technology. Like to see that it has gone a long way. But I think some of that, especially now, like, I don't want to bring the conversation to this. But like we've, we've already mentioned in this episode, specifically like aI making things instantaneous. It's going you make it even more fast. Far as I'm saying is like you can have like, you can have a concept or an idea, and like and use AI as some sort of quote, unquote tool to like, you know, potentially write a novel or write like a paragraph. For you. And it's like, I understand some of it, some of the benefits of some of that, but then, like, you know, in other aspects, it's like, like you're saying before, like we the lost, the lost art of, like, a handwritten note, something nice, and, you know, taking the time to kind of do something.
Stoney 25:16
Or, what about movies? Now you can get, I saw this one reel the other day that took all of the instant when the hero comes to save the day of 15 movies, and did it in a minute and a half. So now you didn't even have to watch the whole movie to see when the hero came in and saved the day. Is that going to hurt movies? You're the resident artsy fartsy guy. Is that going to hurt movies when now you can just, you can get all the stuff you need in a couple of minutes instead of watching a three hour movie or two hour movie? Are we going to lose the film
Jason 25:54
industry? Well, I'm going to hurt it. It's now. I mean, just think of like shows on Netflix and Amazon, and these, these streaming channels at one time, those, those serious shows would, you know the season would and they would do one per week. Oh, yeah. Now they're dumping those back and forth. You can not see in
Stoney 26:18
a week. Do you remember mine really today? If you wanted to, you remember Miami? Yes, right. Love that show. Every Friday it came on, you look they had commercials based on people. Remember the one with the cop pulling the woman over for speeding. She was doing 80 miles an hour in a 50 mile an hour zone, and he pulled her over and said, Why are you speeding? I'm on my way to watch Miami Vice. Okay, you can go there. Yeah, you remember, that is the whole thing based on, you had to Miami Vice. You had to wait a week. Now you just stream and watch the whole thing. And,
Ian 26:53
well, they again, some shows do it. Some again, like, like I said, they it's been one of those things. They've gone back and forth with, with different shows.
Stoney 26:59
And now it's micro seasons instead of 24 episodes in a season. Now they're going to do 10.
Ian 27:07
Yep, they just did it with the most recent version of squid game,
Stoney 27:11
really, because Stranger Things was another one like that, too.
Jason 27:14
Stranger Stranger Things did that. Yes. Toward the very
Ian 27:18
end they did they separated it into two things, I think, as well, yeah, okay, wow. Or they did batches of them, I think is. But I think what, what happened was, I think the special thing about squid game was that, like, they released Season two, and everyone got to the end of it was a cliffhanger, and they're, like, ah, surprise, there's in a bit, right? Season two, part two, or season three, or whatever. So it's like a
Stoney 27:36
what? So are we trading depth for speed? I think
Ian 27:40
it's more so they're trying to, I think right now, they're trying to find a way to keep people engaged without giving them everything. Because everyone know, everyone knows now, like, once a show drops, like, you have literally a couple days before the internet is talking about all the spoilers of it. So it's like, I think they try to mitigate some of that. We're like, how do we keep a show engaging, while also, like, getting people enough of a hit that they can well, but see, that's interesting.
Stoney 28:03
That's what they used to do. They used to create a character and deploy it. I remember watching the game of thrones. Oh yeah, I love the first season was great. And then the last episode that killed my favorite character. I know I'm like, Why the hell would I want to watch this for season two? Exactly, you know, but that's what they're doing to hook you, because it's literally micro seasons, this little thing, this little thing here, and it's like, you killed and then I remember seeing the episode with the writer sitting up on a podium going, Oh, wow, I just realized I killed off most of the people on the
Ian 28:36
podium. Yeah, really. Well, yeah. The book was written far before the show was that's, you know, that's the thing that I think everyone
Jason 28:43
kind of knew, yeah, you go, stay true to the
Ian 28:45
book. I think that's also that. I think that's also, I this is a definitely another discussion for another day. I think that Game of Thrones, the first few seasons of it, was revolutionary for its time. Oh, no other show, no other cinema, no other anything. Had ever done something like they did where, like, they got you super emotionally attached to a character, and then killed them off. And you got to be like, what, multiple times, multiple times, multiple times. I tell you what you there was a you would watch a majority of Game of Thrones and realize, like, nobody is safe, that's right. And then, like, the film space where, like things in that same vein, like Lord of the Rings or other things like that. Like, you know, for a majority, like, most of the time, like, the heroes aren't gonna
Stoney 29:28
but you're right after, yeah, Game of Thrones did that. Oh, other shows started taking on on. It was new. Hey, let's start whacking people. Right. Okay, that didn't sound right. I can't even say whacking off people, because that still doesn't work, yeah, but they started killing off characters
Ian 29:47
and but I think a lot, I think the majority of people up well. I think it should, but it was also, I think they took their time with it. You would have a whole like you were saying, you would have time. You would have all this time of like, of character. Development and growth and emotional investment into this person, you would see their dreams or goals or expert aspirations. You would see like they would even, some of them even started families. And you're like, Oh my gosh. And then something would happen. You're like, I'm emotionally distraught. Now that's like, I think some of that also like, not only is it the good writing, but it's also like, the time aspect that we're talking about. You had all this time to sit in this moment and feel them out and getting engaged and involved with them. That's what you need. Whereas I think in like a two hour movie, you can kind of have that, but it's definitely more succinct, right? And it's, you know, so anyways,
Stoney 30:33
but Well, in another way, we're training ourselves. And I think at one point in time when pagers first came out. Pagers were really it was that instant, you know, when I need someone to get a hold to me. I still have my first pager. I told you all this, yeah, I have all of the technology from my first pager, which was a pin, and all the pin did was beep and it didn't give me any information. When it beeped, I knew I call the answering service to get my message, but then all of the sudden, and I wonder if this is not hap I'd like to talk to somebody about how this is working with the cell phone. But after six to eight months of wearing the pager, there was a neurological thing that happened that even if the pager was not vibrating,
Ian 31:24
you could feel it vibrate. Yeah, they have the same thing right now with phones, they say
Stoney 31:27
because the anticipation of it vibrating would do something to the neuro stuff in your head and made you think it was vibrating.
Ian 31:37
They stay they have the same thing. Now, I think it's called, they have a term for it, but I think it's something like phantom notification, or whatever it is, but has the same kind of, the same sort of, I don't think it's the same thing, but I think it works in the same kind of premise, as whenever someone loses an appendage, and you have the phantom limb right syndrome, where, like you, you you move the you move the the extremity that you that used to have a hand or a foot or something and like an act and go to art still itches, yeah, things like that, even though it's not there, it's like, the something in your brain, well, does something. But I say that because I felt the same thing, right? I've been anticipating a call from somebody yes and like, and I felt and I've moved the wrong way, or
Jason 32:19
something. Did you? Did y'all read about the the marshmallow? No, what's that study?
Ian 32:26
Well, wait, I think this sounds familiar,
Jason 32:28
marshmallow test. Yeah, that was happened back in the 70s, really starting the late 60s and the 70s.
Stoney 32:34
And is it the same thing as how many licks does it take to lick?
Jason 32:40
Oh, that was a great commercial. But no, this was basically, is it like a Pavlov thing or something? Well, it was a test where they they put a child in a room, it put a marshmallow, and they told the child don't eat they don't eat the marshmallow. Okay, you can wait 15 minutes and we'll give you another marshmallow. Got it, and the researcher would leave the room and see if the child would eat the marshmallow. And so it kind of revealed some insights on interesting, on how that worked. It's called the marshmallow test. They say actually, children today are actually better at delaying gratification than their predecessors. A longitudinal study comparing children's performance on the marshmallow test found that kids born in the 2000s waited about two minutes longer on average, than those in 1960 Wow, and one minute longer than those in the 1980s Wow, so and then they said there was another test by a psychologist by the name of John Ross co there was a test over 50 years that children's ability to wait improved steadily, about six seconds per year, really, or roughly one minute per decade,
Ian 34:07
so over the course of 50 years,
Jason 34:09
yeah, yeah. So it was a long it was a long study. I think, from what I was able to read in some of this, there's also a a cultural aspect to this, and I'm gonna bring, I'm gonna get into that, comparing our culture with some of the Eastern, Far Eastern cultures, and kind of the, what I would call the more individualistic culture that exists in the West, yes, versus more collectivist cultures that exist in the east. So and that actually plays a part in this instant gratification and how that plays out. So some pretty interesting stuff. Some other things I saw here, Gen Z, soft, saving mentality, basically living for today. Eight, they say, while younger generations may show improved self control and behavioral tests, their attitudes toward long term goals, tells a different story. Gen Z increasingly embraces what's called soft, saving, okay, prioritizing present day happiness and quality of life over aggressive, long term financial planning. That
Ian 35:31
makes sense. I do agree. There's a lot of times I think, even myself, I feel like I've been privy to that, where I'm like, I would rather focus
Jason 35:38
on right than worry about, yeah, it's going to be 50 years from now, 2025 Harvard study of 18 to 29 year olds found that over 40% say they're barely getting by, and only 16% feel financially Secure.
Ian 35:56
Only 16 16%
Jason 35:59
73% would rather enjoy life now than save more for the future. Wow, yeah. Nearly half have adopted a live for today mindset, yeah. So, whereas maybe previous generations, there was more this idea of looking you know, I'm gonna delete, I'm gonna kind of deny myself stuff now, because I want to have stuff later in life. Now, of course, that
Stoney 36:28
that, that's a whole nother thing, because now you're telling yourself No, right? And these kids today are not hearing the word no. That's part of this instant, instant gratification that they're getting. That's right, you know. So my question is, is this instant world giving us freedom, or is it training us like lab rats for this little lever for a sugar cube? Because these kids, and you can see this today in the kids, when you tell them no and they don't get something instantaneously, they lose, they
Jason 37:01
lose their minds. Yep, they do because their brains are wired to get it now.
Stoney 37:05
They're wired to get it now. And you tell them, No, they're going to lose their mind. They don't know what that is. They don't understand that concept. You know the Sears catalog, right? That's a lot of shopping was done like that. You ordered it. You had to fill out the order form, right? Mail that to Sears. Yep, they could take a couple days to a couple weeks to fill that order and then mail it back to you. But
Jason 37:33
that was, that was the norm. So that was the norm. So there was no
Stoney 37:39
Amazon. You fill it out and it's delivered tomorrow, or it can be delivered that day. On some things, yes, some things. The
Ian 37:46
crazy thing about it is like, even, like, even that, right there, is like, I can imagine having the discussion with someone that came from a time before that. You don't mean,
Jason 37:56
I mean, I remember that. I mean, I don't. I mean, as much as I'm I'm in the culture now, and I enjoy all the conveniences of modern shopping. And instant, you know, go to Amazon, click the button, and I can have my thing. I mean, I've got an item waiting on my door right now that I ordered a couple days ago, that it's already here. So, I mean, it's just
Ian 38:22
we have, I'm talking about the fact that, like, I can hear the what would be like my great grandparents, or my great, great well, they talking about consumerism, saying is, like I can hear them, like, whenever you're talking about Sears catalogs and putting it in there, like, even that for them would have been ridiculous. Like, you should, like, you know, going out to a store and buying it, or what, like, even that like, their perspective of like, like, that is kind of, I feel like, mirroring what's
Stoney 38:50
happening that was new age to them, that was that was fast for them, because you didn't have to make the wool, sew the shirt,
Jason 38:56
right everything. There's so much energy and time that went into just making the basics of life. I mean, you think you just go back in time of how much time went into just growing food, yeah, doing the things that that you know, think of before washing machines. Oh, yeah. Where you know women before, before Pampers, yep. And it was just cloth diapers and, or, you know, whatever was used to how society operate. I mean, it's just, it just was, me look at all the commercials from back in the 50s, when some of these modern conveniences were starting to come on, the dishwasher and all these things. And it was like, Wow, man, quality of life is going to go up because now I don't have to devote all the time.
Ian 39:45
And I think doing all this, that's what I think some of that has, it's given, it's given you that time. It's giving you that
Jason 39:52
it's giving you more more freedom to kind of my personal but
Ian 39:56
then that's what I was saying before, about like, whenever I circle back around to the whole. Like, glorifying the fact that you're busy. Of like, are you actually busy? Are you just like, Oh my God. Like, like, when you really think about it, like, what are you filling that extra time with? If you have things that are done for you, if you're not going shopping, if you have Walmart pickup, if you have things delivered to your house on a regular basis, you have to go out, like, there, if you have a bunch of extra time, and you're like, Oh, I'm so busy, quote, unquote. Like, really think about that, dissect that, and realize, like, how much time are you filling with social media? How much time are you filling with shopping or whatever it is, like that. And you are like, You say you're busy. Because, again, in this society, we all, you know, lift each other up, and we're all busy. Like, Oh, I get it. Me too. I'm so busy. But like, sometimes it's nice to get more of a mental thing. Exactly. It's all of a mental thing. Just saying, by stopping it, like I had to stop because sometimes I would work myself up and I'm like, Oh, I'm so busy. I'm so busy. When I really think about it, I'm sitting here for a couple hours at the end of the day and I'm not doing anything. I'm like, I really am not as I need to stop making busy out to be something that it's like, this thing out to achieve. It's like, it's okay to not do anything. I had a very full I took off a week of work and then came back, and it had to do a bunch of stuff, and worked for like, five or six days straight. And I was like, Oh my gosh. It was like, it was a lot to come back. I always hard to come back, but it's also hard to do that, like, whenever, like, it's hard to come back to work whenever it's one of those, it's a heavy week. So like, yes, you're right. It's hard to get back in the rhythm. But then at the same time, like, I had to look at and look myself in the mirror and go, like, I'm really not going to do anything. You know, there was a Monday, I think was the next day. I was like, I have the chance to take off this Monday. I'm really not going to do anything and like, and that's okay, and I'm okay with that. And I don't have to be busy. I don't have to keep myself occupied. I can just relax. I can clean up the house a little bit. I can relax. I can read the last chapter of the book I'm reading. I can whatever, you know what I'm saying, but, yeah, it's very
Stoney 41:58
one of the things that kind of concerns me about this is the fragility of when you look at how instant this is, you can't make this product very fast, but yet you can ship it tomorrow. So what about the global supply chain pressure index, like we learned during covid, how things that's a fragile supply chain that could snap right quickly, and when you're in this instant world, and we learned during covid, you couldn't get exactly what you wanted when you wanted it. So what happens now, when something happens like in in Los Angeles, people are raiding and pillaging the railroad cars. What happens to all of those people that those packages are supposed to be going to that now, they're so used to getting something tomorrow or next, you know very quickly what happens to that supply chain, how fragile it is. Yep. You know, we're learning in America the fragility of our our systems that could just snap tomorrow, and covid pushed that out and taught us. I don't know that we've learned the lesson, but covid taught us this could be a bad thing. We rely on that instantaneous stuff, that quick, but then so what does Amazon do? They start building these super delivery systems everywhere, and Scott's Miracle Grow was one of the first major companies in America to do that. When they realized how much money they were spending on shipping. They had four or five major plants, and I think his name was Jim Hager Norn or something. He and even in our area in South Louisiana, we got one of those because it was supposed to cut down the shipping times to the Walmart and the other places and save on fuel and make it more instant you ordered it, you got it the next day. You got it the day after. Instead of having to wait a week for it, he was kind of the originals, because that happened 20 years ago when he brought that into our area, but he did that all over the country.
Ian 44:17
I think about this in regards to Amazon, a lot of times we're like, I'm just, I'm curious. How can you not I'm curious. I think I don't. I specifically try my hardest to stay away from Amazon. I really don't like using really, yes, I tried. I have a handful of places that I like to buy equipment from that I think have great customer service, and I think they're doing a wonderful job. And I try my best to buy any kind of equipment. From them. If I ever want to buy anything online, if I'm not going directly to whoever that manufacturer is, I will always go to a local, local store and get it sure I'm not saying like, I'm not brick and mortars. When I say like I'm not, a lot of times it's like, I'm gonna pick it up. It's gonna be a Walmart or, like, a big. Best Buy, or something like that that I try and purchase from. I just, I have not liked the culture around Amazon, and like the A lot of times the stuff that I'm getting from Amazon, it feels I don't know. I don't want to get into that whole situation, but I worry that, like, if something happens in the next few years where, like, what happens if Amazon was to go under, I know they probably wouldn't, but like, if something was to
Jason 45:24
happen, well, I mean, you can bet, you mean they you can trace the success of Amazon to the demise of malls, because, you know, we've become more and more kind of into ourselves, and we would no longer or want to be out there with other people, whereas, unfortunately, no, I remember as a child of, you know, young person, and even my teens of, I mean, the thing was to go to the mall, and you met friends there, you hung out there. You did all those things there. Now it's nobody wants to go. Well, you know, there's a lot of other things going on. I think there's people are afraid of crime. They don't, they don't trust going to these places, because it's more bad things can happen if I and so then you got, you know, fathers, you got husbands saying, No, I don't want you going there. You just order it online and have it delivered to the house. So all those factors, I think, play into kind of this kind of retreating into ourselves, which is a shame, right? Because those are great. Those are fun times. I love going to the mall. Yeah? I mean, you went to the arcade. We We just hung out. It was just that was the thing to this, where all your friends
Ian 46:42
went. I had some I had some time off some some days ago, like I had mentioned, and I went to the mall for the first time in a while, and went to a local shop that I like a lot, and got to give myself a couple things. And I was like, This is really nice. I got the chance to get out a little bit. I mean, was I did I go out with any friends? I talked a lot of people, not a whole bunch. But like, it was nice to be out and about and be around people a little bit. I got some nice stuff and, like, that's the kind of stuff I'm talking about. Was like, I would much rather have that experience, Sure, anything online, because I feel like I have been in a place where, like, I used to use Amazon a lot, and I just it made me feel uncomfortable with the fact of making money going well they, I know they make it easy, make it easy, and then, of course, they just need to make it real easy. I know how much it takes to make a product, not very well, and not as much as some people, but I know, for instance, I like, there was this little, like multi tool thing that I saw, and it's made of aluminum, and it's got like a flashlight on it. It's all this nice stuff. And when I really start thinking about the product costs for how all those different things, I know nobody else thinks about this, and this is such a niche thing for me and how I am, but I look at this product and I'm like, this thing has all these different parts in it that make up what it is I know roughly about how much in Like materials this item would cost. I, in the past, have tried to make some sort of product in the past, and for for me to have something like this manufactured, even if I offset some of like the resources to like, you know, out of the country, I know that I could probably to, to make it profitable for me, I would have to sell it for like, 100 and some bucks, but on Amazon, it's listed for $20 and I know for a fact that Amazon takes a cut. So I'm like, How are you literally, how are you manufacturing a product, taking getting a cut taken from you, and then still turning a profit in some capacity. And that's where it starts to make me feel uncomfortable, because I know that a lot of this is offloaded labor, and I know a lot of it is for lack of a better term, slave labor. And it's like, it's that kind of stuff where, like, all the Timu stuff, a lot of stuff on Amazon that I've looked at, and I don't know where it's coming from or resources. It's just like my mind starts to go to a place from like, this is so cheap, and it is, like, a probably a somewhat quality product, but I'm like, but at what cost I'm getting? I could get it tomorrow. I could get it in a couple hours, because of, like, the city I'm close to. So it's like, man, what? That's where the morality for me comes in, where I'm like, this makes me feel uncomfortable where I'm like, and there's people that can buy stuff that is, once upon a time was a dream to get, and now it's like, I don't know that whole, like, I said, the whole, the whole thing makes me feel uncomfortable Amazon, and it was like, really instant shopping places like that for those reasons. But it's like, that's just like, I said, it's a personal thing for me. Personal thing for me that well, I know that everyone has
Jason 49:45
I want to kind of circle back, because some of the stuff about the marshmallow test is really telling about some of this stuff, they say trust and expectations influence children's choice. Crisis in experiments, children waited longer only when they believe the adult delivering the rewards was reliable. There's also a reliability trust. There's a trust factor that the child is looking at if they trust that that person is going to bring them the second marshmallow. Interesting. They're going to wait and they won't eat it, which I found pretty interesting. That is interesting. They also cultural norms. Also shift outcomes. Japanese preschoolers outperformed American peers when delaying a marshmallow, okay? Aligning with cultural customs found in communal eating, whereas in that culture, you don't eat until everyone has their food and everyone sits down. Whereas in America, it's different. I get it and I do it, but interesting also, Al alter the reward to a wrapped gift a us kids wait longer, really highlighting how familiarity and waiting, like waiting on a birthday or Christmas present, influences behavior. So there's more to this than just simply societal stuff, societal stuff. There's cultural norms, how you're supposed to act, and stuff like that also plays a part. Well,
Stoney 51:31
I want to throw in that y'all, y'all said waiting on birthday and Christmas presents. Yeah, I was in Costco yesterday. It's not even Halloween. Oh, no, Christmas stuff was already in Costco, so they're ingraining this, waiting. Okay, now think about this. Okay, this is this? What is this
Ian 51:51
August? Yeah, we're still okay.
Stoney 51:54
It's August, and they're putting Christmas crap on the shelves already. They waited till Thanksgiving, then they waited till Halloween. Oh yeah. Now what they're gonna start putting Christmas stuff out the week school starts. This is, I'm waiting to me, oh yeah.
Jason 52:11
I think basically it's, they have like, Christmas and Christmas ends, yeah. I mean, I don't know.
Ian 52:19
Now, I feel like now we're starting to see a a real love for Halloween. Yes, that is a big thing that I think has happened more so in the past probably four or five years, I've noticed I want to get
Stoney 52:32
that 12 foot tall, okay, and I was gonna say Halloween, and then I want to move the pose to having putting up Christmas lights, there you go, so he can stay up longer.
Ian 52:45
That's right, I was gonna say it all started with the 12 Foot skeleton. I'm not even kidding.
Jason 52:50
I saw someone in someone's neighborhood had that big skeleton out holding up Christmas lights.
Stoney 52:55
And then with my my brain damage and lack of balance, I saw this one guy who made this mechanical guy, he put a ladder. The ladder fell down, and there was a guy hanging on the edge of the roof, and his legs would swing. And it was so realistic. Somebody called 911 I would love. That's dangerous house. That would be awesome.
Jason 53:17
Another interesting aspect that came out in that marshmallow test, I just find it pretty fascinating. They said children who showed better restraint in eating the marshmallow or not later on in life, found that those same children decades later continued to shore, show more planful behavior, stronger relationships and more effective. Goal oriented.
Stoney 53:46
They were patient. They had patience. It was a virtue for them.
Jason 53:50
Also, there's a neuro link to this. They said neuro economic studies using MRI offer insights that subjects choose between smaller immediate cash and larger delayed vouchers. Immediate options triggered stronger limbic brain responses, while delayed options engage more of the analytical prefrontal cortex. Interesting. So there is, as I'm saying, there is, there is true science behind this, and how the brain processes these things. And I think also it's your you know, economics, yes, play a part. So let's be honest. Someone,
Stoney 54:35
what's your money? What's your what is your currency?
Jason 54:38
Well, I mean to me, if I'm poor. I want it. That's
Stoney 54:42
what I'm saying. I don't even mean real money. I mean for a kid, a marshmallow is currency, right? Okay, you see what I'm saying. That's what he wants. If you put an iron, a clothes iron, and said, Don't touch that. If you don't touch it for 30 minutes, I'll give you another iron. You're not gonna give a crap. Sure, but if you put a Marshall, that's their currency. So
Jason 55:04
yeah, they say scare. The scarcity mindset plays a part in whether someone, in essence, grabs the marshmallow now or waits to have the second one
Ian 55:17
interesting.
Jason 55:18
So yeah, so connection to one's future self matters. Okay? Plays a part, right? You know, if you're thinking long term, you're gonna maybe hold off on the marshmallow. Yeah, you'll wait for the second marshmallow. But if you're not thinking long term, and I'm thinking like, right now, like, and I don't think I'm gonna be here. And, yeah, I'm on it now.
Stoney 55:44
Just ate right before the test. You may not be hungry enough since
Ian 55:49
last time grocery shopping on empty strike,
Stoney 55:53
that's a rule. They say, don't, don't do
Ian 55:55
that. Oh, goodness, I know. I say that because I've done it myself, or I've been super hungry, and I've been like, Man, I spent $250 at the grocery store. But sometimes it's good to have, like, you know, but still, this is interesting, and I do also I'm curious, like, even in like, certain areas of like the US, like, you're saying different, like, different structures of like, home life, different economic backgrounds, like, I wonder how much some of that plays into it, too, but I think a majority it's kind of ubiquitous, with technology, with cell phones, with social media. I think it really has shifted us in a different direction.
Stoney 56:29
One of the things I like about episodes like this is we really haven't gotten into the political realm that we seem to have gotten into lately. But Did y'all see this week that Nancy Pelosi is lawsuit against St Francis Hospital was dismissed by the judge. No, Did y'all see that she she had a lawsuit against this hospital. Former Speaker Pelosi had filed a $10 million lawsuit. Wow, $10 million I guess their money's starting to run out, and she's got to figure some stuff out, right? Claiming that her husband Paul had become impotent following a recent surgery, the case was dismissed when the surgeon explained that he only had removed the cataracts from both Pelosi eyes, therefore improving his eyesight but
Jason 57:27
there's always a catch. There's
Ian 57:30
always a gotcha there in the end, yeah, sorry, right.
Jason 57:37
We always pick on Oh Nancy. I had the actual opportunity to actually meet her in person. I'm sorry, but you're okay now. I'm okay now. That's good. Yeah, it's been some years back, but yes, I did have an opportunity to be around her for several hours. There you
Stoney 57:53
go. So I'm so sorry.
Ian 57:55
Yeah, well, hey, you know,
Jason 57:58
she's a little small lady, she was nice to me at the time, but, you know, whatever that means. But
Ian 58:05
I recently got a, got a letter from our governor about some things that are happening in the state or whatever. And it was very interesting to, like, get, like, an official, it would feel like an official document on, like, nice paper with like a seal that says from the desk of the governor, and that's like, taxpayer dollars, yeah. And I was like, Hey, this is nice. So anyways,
Jason 58:23
yeah, here's some other some things have come out of some of these studies that they say across Germany and Kenya, children showed greater willingness to wait when told they'd be evaluated as a pair. Okay? Suggest accountability, suggesting that reputational or cooperative factors can enhance patience, because no one
Ian 58:46
wants to be the first one. That's right. Nobody wants to be the one to break the surface. No one wants
Jason 58:51
to think about at the at the table when, you know, when it comes to food, oh yeah, nobody. Everybody's kind of waiting for one person. Yeah. Everybody's got all frozen, yo, no. You go for Oh no, you sitting there and you kind of having an argument.
Ian 59:05
But the second that someone breaks the tension, a lot of times, it's easier for everyone to someone's like, no, no, go ahead. Eat. Go ahead. Yeah. They're like, okay, yeah, I've been in that's the same thing with I've been in some to keep everything vague on purpose. I've been in some meetings where something was, something was posed at the meeting by the higher up, and everyone was silent, and no one wanted to say anything. And there was like, a little bit of tension about like, Well, I'm not sure everyone was kind of like, ah. And then the higher up that was working with was like, we don't have to make a decision. Now, let's, uh, let's make a poll. Well, I'll email out, like a I'll email out anybody or everybody on this table individually, and then you just reply back to me what like your vote is. And then, of course, it'll all be anonymous for everyone else, but I'll know if we can move forward, it can be some. Think we all have buy in on and I'll take the majority, and then we'll move forward, if that's what everyone everyone's like, I trust that. So anyways, we all left that meeting feeling that way, and I tell you what, not a single no was submitted, but it was the tension of like we're changing something, where it was a very big decision happening, and no one wanted to break the 10 to be the first person to say yeah, and then just shake it all up. But the second, everyone had their voice, and it was a thing behind the scenes, it was very much like a different feeling, which is so interesting to hear, that it was like everyone is on board, but just not quite comfortable to be that first person to break the tension. So that's very true and interesting to hear. So
Stoney 1:00:38
hey, did you know, the hospital that you were born in is the only building that we exit without entering. What
Ian 1:00:48
do you mean by that?
Jason 1:00:50
Is this a,
Ian 1:00:52
I was gonna say it's a play. I feel like a play on words. Probably. I feel like I'm too, too unaware right now Morning, Miss two of his jokes. I feel like, oh man.
Stoney 1:01:05
Well, think about it. Okay, what building Have you ever exited that you didn't go into first? Oh, that's true.
Ian 1:01:12
You're right, unless you mean like, yeah, you're right, you're right. You're just saying somehow, yeah, exit, yeah, yeah. Oh, my God,
Stoney 1:01:21
killing me. Y'all are killing me. And with that, I think
Ian 1:01:26
that is today's episode.
Jason 1:01:28
Thank you, everyone. Very informative.
Ian 1:01:31
I hope, I hope that every one of you listeners is more intelligent than Jason and I are right now at being able to pick up on his humor, on his humor. Yes, if anybody wants to reach out, we have all the comment sections on. I
Stoney 1:01:45
like these episodes because we can be funny. We get on some serious ones, and it's hard to crack a joke. It's hard to take away from the information. I'm sorry, make up for some
Ian 1:01:56
great a great conclusion to the show. Because I do, I honestly do. If anybody wants to reach out, we have the comment sections on YouTube and Spotify Be sure to like and rate wherever you can. We also have the email address get defended together@gmail.com,
Stoney 1:02:10
and the website only takes four seconds to load. There
Ian 1:02:14
you go. Imagine that retrospect.com, apparently, but until next week, thank you so much for listening. Bye, bye, goodbye everyone,
Jason 1:02:23
and God bless.
Stoney 1:02:25
We measure progress by speed, how fast we connect, how quickly we consume, how instantly we can respond. The instant world promises everything now, but maybe the real question isn't how fast we get it, it's how deeply we experience it once it arrives. Because when everything is immediate, we risk mistaking motion for meaning, speed for significance. The paradox of living instantly in this the faster life moves, the easier it becomes to miss it. What matters most, the love we build, the work we're proud of, the memories we carry, rarely comes in an instant. Those things take time, effort and patience. So perhaps the greatest challenge of the instant world is not learning how to move faster, but learning when to slow down, because we let the instant replace important, we may gain a world of convenience, but lose everything that makes life worth living. So I'll leave you with this, what in your life is too important to be rushed. You're the best. Peace.