Delaying Gratification is Overrated(Find your Zone of Genius Instead)

Yeah, you read that right I said it's overrated.

Author

Christian LaBosco
July 11, 2024

Yeah, you read that right I said it's overrated.

That doesn't mean it doesn't have a use.

However, it is overused and over-recommended.

There are a couple of problems with delaying gratification.

The ones who are the most successful do a pursuit for the sake of it.

Those who have great success delay gratification. I believe that there is an even greater level to this where people don’t even think about needing to delay gratification and just do it for the sake of doing it.

For example Joe Rogan recorded his podcast for 5 years before making money or knowing the analytics, this to me is the reason he was so successful.

The same goes for professional sports players. They have found their "zone of genius"—that certain sport.

Another problem is that people often do things as a means to an end, so they quit when they don’t achieve the “end” result.

When you are delaying gratification, you are inherently focused on the outcome rather than the process itself.

If you're writing on Twitter to grow to 100 followers this month, you are delaying the gratification of the followers. So instead of solely focusing on your craft, your inherent goal becomes follower count.

It would be like if Lionel Messi mainly played soccer to get the Ballon d'Or. Now, this could be a reference point for success, but if he delayed gratification to reach this goal, he likely would have quit simply because it took an incredible amount of dedication. Due to the dedication it took he relied on intrinsic motivators like mastery and autotelicity(love of doing something for the sake.

Delaying gratification means playing a finite game rather than an infinite one. The game is finite because when you consciously delay gratification, you are delaying the gratification from achieving an outcome.

The beauty of infinite games is that they never end, thus encouraging sustainable growth, since you can never complete the game.

However, there are benefits to delaying gratification in the shorter term, such as the fact that people will quit when they don’t see direct/immediate results from their efforts.

Now, this may contradict what I said earlier, but this is the difference. Delaying gratification helps you in the short-to-midterm because you don't quit. However, since you are mostly focused on the outcome, burnout is more likely.

When you do something for the sake of doing it, you will likely outlast the person who delays gratification as you draw from intrinsic motivation.

Take a person who trains soccer solely to get a trophy versus a person who trains soccer because they love the craft.

In my past ventures into business, I often quit after not seeing results in a certain amount of time. Even if I was getting results, I was not passionate about the things I had to do to get them.

For instance, TikTok was an example of both of these - I disliked finding clips for content, and I wasn’t getting results.

However, Twitter(X) was the opposite - I loved networking and sharing my ideas, and I was getting steady results.

Sometimes, I wasn’t getting results, but learning, writing, networking, and podcasting for the sake of it kept me moving forward when the results of my input weren't apparent.

If you become obsessed with delaying gratification, you can end up wasting your whole life waiting for an outcome rather than enjoying the process.

You will spend time on a pursuit that wasn’t your zone of genius.

The main self-improvement space will tell you to delay and delay gratification. This is good in some cases, but in the end, if you're delaying gratification for your whole life fundamentally, I don’t see a difference between that and a 9-5 with waiting to retire.

It goes against much spiritual advice in many ways because you are rarely in the moment because you are focused on the outcome and waiting for it to come.

How to balance Delaying Gratification

The key is to delay Gratification in micro aspects but choose a broad pursuit that feels like play.

Delaying gratification is a tool, not a way of life.

I’ll show you a process to delay gratification as well as a process to find a macro area where you don’t have to delay gratification

How to find your Zone of Genius

You find your zone of genius through constant experimentation. You may find it soon, or it may take a while. If you find it, it may evolve or stay the same.

I hope to help you find your zone of genius with these 5 reflection questions.

For each one, I will give some personal examples that will hopefully help spark some inspiration for you.

1. What felt like play to you as a kid?

For me, some of the answers are:

Sports

Legos

Strategizing

Video Games

Problem-Solving

2. Who are the creators, writers, and thinkers you like the most?

For me, some of those people are:

Dan Koe

Napoleon Hill

Albert Einstein

Naval Ravikant

Jordan Peterson

3. What would you do even if you made nothing from doing it?

For me, some of those things are:

Sports

Writing

Learning

Good Conversations

4. What is your personality type?

You can find this by taking a couple of different tests:

I personally am an INFJ-T

Once you have determined your personality research, others had a similar personality. And research some of the common pursuits, strengths, and weaknesses of your personality type.

5. Based on the first 4 answers, what interests/pursuits align with who you are?

Based on all this, you will have a good overview of who you are and what you resonate with.

This will help you determine your interests and, thus, what some pursuits feel like play that you could do for a living.

How to Delay Gratification

Once you have a broad pursuit that feels like play, it is time to build your ability to delay gratification in micro areas.

Delaying Gratification and Discipline are similar in many ways.

5 Steps for Delaying Gratification

1) Anti-Vision

First, you need to be clear on what you don't want. Often, the brain is more adept at knowing what it doesn't want.

Create a clear vision of the future that frightens you.

It may be working a corporate job or living paycheck to paycheck.

People are often in a hypnotic rhythm because they aren't consciously aware of what they don't want.

You become crystal clear on what you don't want in your life.

An anti-vision will give you a reference point.

2) Vision

Reverse engineer your anti-vision and create a vision that lights you up.

You want to smile just thinking about it.

This will give you another reference point from which to view your actions.

3) Identify

Identify some of the areas where you will need to employ gratification.

By this point, you might have noticed I'm a big soccer fan, so let's use another soccer analogy.

Example:

Broad pursuit/Zone of Genius: Soccer

Areas where you need to delay gratification: Dieting, Gym, Studying Film

The areas that you need to delay gratification are the areas you aren't incredibly passionate about, but you delay gratification because they help with your broader zone of genius.

You may not like all aspects of your pursuit, so you can use the tool of delayed gratification to address the areas that you don't like.

4) Identity

There has been evidence of this power of identity with Alcoholics. Those who said they were trying to quit drinking alcohol were more prone to going back.

While those who identified as sober and non-alcoholic were less likely to drink again.

The reason behind this is that humans need to protect their identities. If someone or something threatens our identity, we will act to prevent it from happening. In this case, drinking alcohol threatened a sober person's identity.

You need to identify as a disciplined person.

Because a disciplined person would use delayed gratification when necessary and be good at delaying it.

5) Meditation

This habit helps with so many other areas but will help you build your "delaying gratification muscle."

By meditating, you have to sit with yourself and get no easy gratification from scrolling, eating, etc.

It's the ultimate exercise for delaying gratification.

One other thing I'd like to note is that sometimes the first step to doing something for the sake of is delaying gratification because, after enough delaying of gratification, you might fall in love with that pursuit.

That’s all for this letter.

If you enjoyed it, you’ll enjoy what went on this week (below).

Christian LaBosco

Update on This Last Week

I'll be hosting a podcast with Dakota Robertson, one of the biggest creators on Twitter(X). The podcast will be 90 minutes long and premiere this Sunday at 10 a.m. You can subscribe to my YouTube channel to get a notification when it goes up.

There's also a new podcast out with Martin(the fastest-growing creator on X), released last Sunday! I would appreciate it if you commented on Spotify or YouTube with your biggest lesson or takeaway and what you thought of the podcast!

I've also been developing a four-week coaching program for new Twitter creators who want help with brand clarity and direction, writing skills development, and more.

(There are limited spots; I can only have 3 students at a time)

PS. The YouTube version of this newsletter will be up in 2 weeks, and I hope you have a wonderful rest of your week.