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Welcome creatives! These are discussions, thoughts, case studies, interviews, and lessons about how our creativity relates to life. The host, Mr Benja, is a former video game programmer / designer for Rockstar Games, Sony Santa Monica, The 3DO Company, and others, as well as a fine artist. -- Be sure to check out the website for more.
Back in the 1960s, there was
something that became known as the
Stanford Marshmallow Experiment.
You may have heard about it.
It has a lot to do with willpower, and a
lot of the people that run our education,
our systems of development and growth, and
just people in general have begun to take
this Stanford Experiment from the 1960s
very, very seriously, as if it was law.
But that's not true.
The total case.
It may have been misinformation that we
were fed all of these years, and I'm going
to get into a little bit of that today
on Creativity Threads Live, because it's
important to understand that In the act
of trying to create something, you may end
up with information that's a little bad.
Information that's a little old.
Information that is just
misleading or plain flat out wrong.
Or, at the very best, in terms of
you dealing with whatever you're
dealing with, you find that it
doesn't work for you, and then you
can move on to a better experience.
So!
Want to shout out to everybody
coming through on Instagram
and Facebook and YouTube.
When I do these live, I go live
pretty much most weeknights,
but not all the time.
Whenever I feel like it right now.
So we may get down to a very specific
schedule at some point, but for right now,
I'm still working to fit it in my schedule
and Hey, it's only January of 2024.
So we can keep going like that.
Right.
Right.
All right.
So what I'm going to do here is I'm going
to give a little more information on
this experiment and get to a point that
hopefully makes the case for you not
delaying your gratification unnecessarily.
There's a lot of talk out there
about delaying gratification.
And a lot of it is based in
fact, on this marshmallow study.
The Marshmallow Experiment from Stanford.
So, I don't want to try to debunk or
prove it's a myth or anything like that.
But, enough people have done work on
this where there are enough large holes
in it where it needs to be explained.
Because, if you're trying to
create and you're delaying your
gratification, you may be damaging
yourself or hurting yourself or not
accomplishing your goals because of it.
So, let's get back to the experiment.
So, back in the 1960s, these
scientists did this experiment.
You can find this on the Atlantic.
They, um The Atlantic or just
anywhere else that's going to go
through the whole gamut of this.
But basically they got a bunch of kids in
a room together and told these kids, Hey,
listen, kids, there are marshmallows here.
They're for you, but you're not
supposed to eat them right now.
You have right now.
If you can wait.
So the researchers would leave
the room, watch the kids.
The kids would start fidgeting.
Kids would get nervous.
They're like, man, I want a
marshmallow, but they were told to wait.
And then the whole experiment was
to see how much they could delay
gratification to get a bigger reward
later, to get more marshmallows later.
Many of the kids failed.
Some succeeded, whatever.
Years later, they tracked these
students, they tracked these kids and
were like, Oh my gosh, look, the kids
were able to delay gratification.
They did better in life and everybody
was like, well, there goes, if you have
more willpower, you're going to grow
up to be a more affluent person, you're
going to have more success because you
were able to delay marshmallows as a kid.
That's a, a telltale sign that you
were able to have willpower and you're,
you end up with a better life and.
You know, they shook their hands and
patted themselves in the back, and
they thought they were done with it.
And for a long time, we kind
of went along with this thing.
About 50 years.
Because, after the um, after some time, in
the 90s, people started to question that.
And I'll get to the 2010s, I know
the math doesn't add up there.
I was talking about the later studies.
But, there was a study in between
the time, in the 90s, Where they
started to question these results
and saying hey wait a minute Are
these results really true because
there could be a lot of reasons why?
Somebody would as a child not have
the not decide to go ahead and eat
the marshmallow they have right then
And not delay gratification, quote
unquote, as, as they called it.
And then that person still
ended up being unsuccessful.
They were like, well, what if the kids
were just used to, because of their
parenting, used to just eating whatever
was put in front of them right then.
What if they were taught, Hey,
don't let your food get cold
or don't let food sit around.
Or maybe they came from.
Maybe they came from low income
families where you were supposed
to go ahead and get what you could
when you could, maybe that would,
that made sense for those kids.
It's like, Hey, you have a chance to
get something, go ahead and get it.
And then go about your business.
Which could lead to some other things.
Or maybe the kids of the, and it was
a relatively small group, so maybe
the kids of these people who were
doing well, maybe the parents were the
affluent ones and they had a, you know,
the kids weren't, weren't ever pressed.
It's like, yeah, I could
eat food whenever I want.
Why would I worry about eating it now?
I can get food later.
It doesn't matter.
So there were all of these different
thoughts and reasons why parents might
be Or the, the parents might behave
a certain way causing the kids to
behave a certain way or the environment
might behave a certain way causing
the kids to Behave a certain way,
just the habit, the culture, um, maybe
it was the fact that they were using
marshmallows instead of something else.
There were all these questions that were
brought up, poking many, many holes in
this argument and the very foundation
of a lot of psychology that's been going
around saying that, yes, if you delay
gratification, you will do better in life.
And there is, you know, there
is definitely reason to delay
gratification, but let me stick
to this study for just one second.
So this was supposed to be a willpower
test and somebody said, well, you
can't just go poke holes in it.
We're from Stanford.
We stand by what we did
back in the sixties.
We're going to do another study.
They did another study
and it was terrible.
They did a new study with fewer
than 90 children, all enrolled in
preschool on Stanford's campus.
And when they restaged the
experiment from the sixties,
They tried to do this thing with
children of the, like, faculty and staff.
So they just grabbed kids from,
like, the Stanford Daycare Center
and Stanford faculty and staff.
Their children and kids that were
available to them and put them in this
study and it's like wait a minute That's
what you're calling a study 90 kids.
So I want to make sure
i'm reading it, right?
Um, because 90 kids is really isn't a
lot and it's almost it's almost comical
to think that you would Take this very
small group of children from a very
Specific area in the world and at a very
specific point in time and in a very
specific class of people and put this
Bold psychological statement out there.
So what they ended up finding out
is that the new study said that um
Let me just read from the Atlantic
here, just this quick little segment.
Ultimately, the new study finds
limited support for the idea that
being able to delay gratification
leads to better outcomes.
Instead, it suggests that the capacity
to hold out for a second marshmallow
is shaped in large part by a child's
social and economic background.
And, in turn, that the background, not the
ability to delay gratification, is what
is behind the kid's long term success.
If I was a kid, I mean, do
you hear that statement?
It doesn't relate.
So all this time you've been thought
to, thought to, you've been taught
to believe delayed gratification
is the way to go to, to get success
and it will enhance your willpower.
That result is very inconclusive,
which means you have the ability to
try different things out for yourself.
Does this mean, go do everything that
you feel, go grab everything that you
want, go just, go just buck wild and
not worry about the future at all,
don't save any money, don't invest,
don't, no, I'm not saying any of that,
because I believe in all of those things.
What I don't believe in is this
idea that you should damage
yourself by not enjoying the future.
Then when are you ever
going to live your life?
How will you ever be content
with what you're doing?
This goes for a lot of corporate people.
This goes for a lot of small business
entities, a lot of families, a lot
of people in learning institutions.
You're basically being set up to
forsake your present at the expense
of a future that may or may not come.
So what do I say to that?
What, what would I suggest to do?
Well, I don't know what you should
do, but let me tell you something.
About how I went around about things, how
I, how I decided to learn, um, how I, how
I came across this bit of a revelation.
I started seeing that the more I push
stuff out into the future, yes, I got
certain gains from looking at the future
and thinking about what was coming
up and, but nothing wrong with it.
But what I realized is I started
to lose sight of the present.
Until I ran into the woo woo crowd,
Ix, Abraham, all that woo
woo business, Dwayne Dyer.
I began to start looking at what I was
doing in the present more, being more
present with the current state of things.
Just living in the moment, not living
for the moment, but living in the moment.
Experiencing everything around
me that life had to offer.
If I'm on a drive, I'm listening
carefully to I'm listening to the road.
I'm listening to whatever's on the radio.
I'm taking in the peacefulness or the
just whatever the state is of the drive,
just being at peace with the moment.
I'm out here in LA, so it's
not always a peaceful drive,
but you get what I'm saying.
So we have these two emotions and I want
to, I want to really quickly illustrate
why thinking about the present and
existing in the moment is so important.
There are two negative emotions that crop
up when you focus outside of the moment.
There's one in the past.
That will start to bring
up feelings of guilt.
You start thinking too much in the past.
You know, what could I have done, or
I should have done that differently?
Man, I wish I had, and then you get
a lot of guilt, regret, longing for
something that doesn't exist anymore.
Maybe even shame because you, you felt bad
about something that may have happened.
That's all thinking about the past and
just continuing to, to ruminate and wonder
about things in the past and man, I wish I
would have told them or, that's all gone.
And the only thing that exists
now is how you frame that past,
which you can do in the positive.
I mentioned that in a previous podcast.
So go back to it if you haven't heard it.
And then there's the future thinking
about things in a future state.
If we tend to think about the future
in negative ways, we start to get into
a sense of, well, I'd better, you get
very stressed in terms of thinking you'd
better get something done or else that,
or else thinking, and you start to worry.
You get into feelings of
trepidation, fear, worry.
Something's not going to happen for
a week and you're already nervous.
Like you've got a whole six days
or six days and some hours before
the thing actually happens.
In the meantime, you can calm down.
Nothing's going to happen
to you in the meantime.
If any of that fearful, worrying energy
comes up, you may want to go ahead and
put that energy into something in the
present that will help you forward.
Obviously.
You may want to put that
energy towards good things.
But there's no need to get upset over it.
It hasn't happened yet.
So those are the two emotions
that you really have to deal with.
Uh, in the past, you have to deal
with guilt and in the future,
you have to deal with worry.
Worry and its associated fears and
problems and guilt from the past and
its associated fears and problems.
So back to this experiment and not
delaying your own gratification.
When you're creating, when you're
developing, when you're trying to reach
a goal or make a resolution, you have
this ideal self that's way out there.
You're, and you're, you're starting the
process of figuring out your goals and
you're looking into the future and you're
saying, I want to be there because before
I wasn't there and much of the framing
that happens is automatically outside
of the present by the nature of it.
They're like, yeah, look back at
two thousand twenty one, twenty,
twenty nineteen, eighteen, seventeen.
Look back in the past, see what all went
wrong, you were a screw up then, are
you gonna be a screw up in the future?
And it's this whole back and forth
between the past and the future.
And what you should be doing is
thinking more in the present.
How are you feeling right now?
Are you headed in that direction that's
going to get you somewhere positive?
You should be happy with where you are
now because that's simply where you are.
And maybe happy is not the right
word, but you are where you are
right now, and I don't know how much
good it will do you to be upset with
yourself where you are right now.
You just make choices in the moment.
Appreciate the moment.
Make good choices in the moment.
And love the moment for what it is.
A chance to make better choices.
A chance to improve on what you've done.
A chance to learn through
action and living and being,
and this is the creative spirit.
If at any given moment, you're not
creating the life, the way you see it
with the energy that you have right now,
you may be off balance a little bit.
So thinking about the future, right?
Cause we're always talking about goals
and resolutions and getting somewhere.
In the future.
And we're supposed to, they
say delay gratification.
Okay.
Let's say we're building a house.
Software development, game
development, building a house is
always the example we like to use
when you're creating and you're
thinking about the future.
Let's say you've got this
house ideas, big house.
It's going to be on the, on a hill.
It's going to have this fence painted.
Your favorite color of orange, this
orange fence and this gaudy house.
Nobody likes it, but you like it.
So you're happy about it.
You're going to create this house.
It's going to be awesome.
Um, maybe you'll even have
a purple driveway, whatever.
You got all these crazy
ideas for this house.
You're going to have, now there are
a lot of steps to get to that house.
You have to find the contractors.
You have to get your funding together.
You have to find an agency that's going
to help you get all, get all your licenses
together for, for building the house.
You're going to need to get
some knowledge on real estate.
You're going to need to check with
local development codes to see if
anything you're doing is in line or not.
You're going to need to schedule.
You're going to need to plan
and you're going to need to actually,
you know, take out your, as I said,
you're built, you're building this house.
So you're going to have to do the
whole, you're going to have to start
with the electric work, the plumbing.
You're going to have
to build up the frame.
You're gonna have to
do all sorts of things.
It's a process we've done a lot, but
it's still a process nonetheless.
So when you're in the process of building
this house, how can you, how can you
have gratification about the process?
You got to go get lumber for the house.
Maybe you don't personally,
but that's got to get done.
Maybe you could enjoy yourself by
talking to the people building or
getting the lumber and say, Hey,
what kind of lumber should I get?
I heard that they were doing this new
thing with this type of wood and it,
it makes it better for insulation.
It's like, okay, you might
learn something there.
Enjoy that part of the process.
You know, while they're talking
about the wiring up the electricity,
maybe you want to create a certain
way of wiring up your house.
Like, you know what, I'm going to
need ethernet all through the house.
And we're also going to have
this new type of wifi set up.
So we should be able to bridge
these ethernet connections
together in this certain way,
that's really interesting to me.
Let me talk to the
electricians about that.
Let me see if I can get a tech
specialist out here to really
wire up my house the right way.
Let me have fun with it.
Driveway.
More construction.
Talking to the concrete guys.
This all may seem like a hassle
to you because all you may want
is the house at the end of it.
But the house at the end of it matters
because of all the things you put into it.
If you can get that framing in your
head for whatever you're trying to
build, you'll be much better off.
Understanding that every moment
along the way is adding to your
appreciation of life in the future.
Does that make any sense?
If it does not get at me in the
comments, I want to know what you think.
More present example, the gyms, you're
going to the gym, trying to get fit.
Maybe you don't like to sweat.
Maybe you don't like actually, and
you know, some people will say this.
They're like, Oh, who, who
likes to go to the gym?
I think I said this before in my, my
other example, I'll use it again here.
My previous podcast, the
McDonald's example, two people
go to work for McDonald's.
This is a true story, by the way,
from, uh, from Grant Cardone.
Oh, this is a true according to him.
But basically, he said, he went
to McDonald's and hated it.
He was a worker there, an employee, went
home smelling like french fries, he was
tired, clothes were dirty, didn't get
much great social interaction from people
during the day, he was tired, didn't
think he was getting much money, didn't
think he was getting treated fairly.
Wasn't learning much of anything and
he got upset at the job, but there was
another person there who was working to
be a franchise manager and he started
learning everything you could about
the job and was excited every day.
That person had gratitude for
every moment he was there.
And it was just a simple way
of thinking about the job.
I'm
not saying you should be happy about
your current situation necessarily.
You don't have to be
happy about a situation.
But you should be content with your life.
Uh, let me not screw this one up.
You're in your life at your moment.
You should be content with who you are
and the possibilities you can uncover.
The things you can do,
the abilities you have,
you should be okay with yourself.
And by being okay with yourself,
I don't mean in the same spot.
I mean, you're a vector.
You're not just a direction.
You have direction and magnitude.
You're moving towards this
place that you want to be.
At any given moment,
someone checks your speed.
You are moving.
You're growing, you're learning,
you're doing something.
Maybe the next day you do it
a little better, that's fine.
But for right now, you're doing what
you can and you're moving forward.
You're letting go of nonsense and
adding more of the good sense.
But they'll tell you
to delay gratification.
They'll say, you know what, you can't
be happy until you get out of this job.
It may take you two years
to get out of that job.
It may take you two months.
You may just go to another
job that you think would be
better, and it's actually worse.
And that's what happens in a lot
of situations while we're at it.
People think they're just gonna get up
and leave a job, but then they take all
their problems with them to the next job,
and then the next job becomes a problem.
Because no matter where
you go, there you are.
So let's say you're working at
McDonald's, and you don't want to.
The McDonald's example is better
than the house example, I think.
It makes a little more sense to people.
But let's say you're at this
McDonald's still, and you're
wondering, what can I do?
People come in every day.
Let me start talking to them.
Let me see if I can try
memorizing everyone's name.
Let's see if I can properly Ration
out the number of burgers that
we're going to need for the day.
Let's make it a guessing game See who
guesses the closest amount of burgers that
are sold during lunchtime or whatever.
Let's see if we can You know, actually
not just memorizing names, but let's
see if we can practice our networking
skills and see how many new people we
can meet and find out what their jobs
are without being creepy or anything.
Let's see, see what we can learn.
And some people get mad at this
type of thinking because they start
yelling at you that you're not doing
your job, that you're playing around.
It's like, listen, this is your job.
You applied for, you know, you're inbounds
as, I mean, if they don't like it too
much, of course, they'll get rid of you,
but you made the choice to be there.
So do have some latitude and how you
decide to operate while you're there, how
you decide to maintain and carry yourself.
What can you figure out?
Maybe you like dealing with money.
Hang out at the cash register.
Start figuring out more and more
about how the money flows in.
Start talking to the manager about
the hours there and how things get
distributed in terms of not just pay,
but maybe bonuses and things like that.
Get what you can out of the
company and keep moving forward
to something bigger and better.
If that's, if McDonald's is not
your final goal, and I don't think
it's many people's final goal.
Then spend time thinking about what
you can do with the skills that
you're learning while you're there.
Some people try to act
like they're not there.
And I think that's a difficult position.
Because then you start getting upset with
the world for being what the world is.
Whatever it is.
It could be the greatest thing, greatest
opportunity, and you're just upset.
For no really good reason.
We tend to get sold this idea
of delayed gratification.
Just put your head down and in five
years you'll wake up and you'll
be out of here and it'll be over.
That's a hamster wheel.
Hey, you just go to school, get
good grades, and then go to, you
know, you graduate to high school,
get good grades, and make good
connections with colleges there, get
a scholarship, and go to college.
Then go to college and get good grades.
You'll go somewhere else from there
and they'll tell you all this stuff.
And there's this, this plan, right?
This don't ever be happy
with where you are.
Just keep on going.
And that's a lot of the idea
behind delayed gratification.
So what don't you want to do if you get,
you know, if you get some, uh, if you come
across some funds, you don't necessarily
have to blow all your money right away
because, hey, screw delayed gratification.
Be happy taking that money to the bank or
investing it or spending money on things
that will grow for you in the future.
Just be happy about that.
Take your gratification now
when, when possible, it's,
you're trying to live your life.
And if every moment of your life is
spent thinking about some far off,
you'll never have kind of idea.
Then you'll never enjoy
your life the way it is.
And you know, they go back to, you
always go back to that old idea of
You know, what do people, what do old
people say when they're on the deathbed?
They, things they regret not doing.
So how do you avoid, how do
you get instant gratification
and not destroy your life?
Because getting perfect delayed
gratification, getting perfectly
instant gratification will
probably destroy many of us, right?
Um, or we just don't think about anything.
We don't pay the bills.
We just like, Ooh, I'm
living for the moment.
That's the other side of it.
That's the stupid side of it.
You don't want to do that.
You don't want to go too far that way.
If
you know you gotta pay your bills, you
should be happy, just like, Hey listen,
I got a roof over my head, I got this
and that, let me knock this electric
bill out and go about my business.
If I have some little extra
money here, maybe I'll save it,
maybe I'll spend it, whatever.
But just don't be upset
at the current moment.
Don't deny yourself too much.
Because one thing that tends to happen, Is
it's like when you go on a diet
and this is tying back to the
whole resolutions and goals thing.
And
then let's say we reach our
goal or we miss our goal.
Either way, something happens and we
just decide to fall off the wagon.
We're like, screw it.
I don't care.
I did this and it didn't, didn't make
me feel good while I was doing it.
It's not that great of a thing, whatever.
If that happens, it's often because the
mindset was about delayed gratification.
If you can start to enjoy the process,
enjoy the gym process, enjoy working
at McDonald's while you're there,
don't enjoy working through McDonald's.
Maybe that's a better way of putting it.
Not working, not being
stuck at McDonald's.
But working through McDonald's,
start figuring out how
to use your time better.
It's like, boom, when I get up, I
found I waste 45 minutes messing around
with X, Y, and Z and social media.
What I can do instead is
have my breakfast ready.
My clothes out the
night before boom, boom.
So instead of 45 minutes wasted in the
morning, I only use a 15 minutes and
you feel a little better about yourself.
You just got a half hour back, add
that up over a month or however
long you're at that, at that sad
situation, that McDonald's or whatever.
And suddenly you've got many
half hours piling up and you're
feeling great about yourself again.
I suppose you'll save about
50 hours that way, if you just
got a half hour back every day.
50 hours a month, sounds good.
Um, 25 I mean, bad math.
Anyway,
if you can take enjoyment in the present
and still move towards your goals.
Making, moving towards your goals,
not getting there, moving towards
them, the exciting part of it.
Runners can tell you this.
It's not about, and people will
tell you, it's about the journey.
Why do they say this?
Because what is that, what is that
goal except a metric, a number,
a checkmark on a spreadsheet?
It's a continuing point.
It's a, it's a measurement, it's
a marker, a watershed moment.
And
if you can enjoy all the steps of the
process, I guarantee you, your mind
and your spirit will thank you for it.
Your mind and your spirit
will be much better off.
And when your mind and your spirit is much
better off, then you'll be much, much more
equipped to take care of your trajectory,
your, your momentum moving forward.
And maybe, let's say, let's say you move
on from McDonald's to another restaurant.
Right?
Get to this new restaurant and you
enjoyed everything about what you did.
Not what McDonald's offered
you, but what you did.
You enjoyed what you were doing when you
were, when you happened to be under the
employment of McDonald's Corporation.
And let's say you start working
at a slightly higher end,
more higher end restaurant.
Cheesecake factory.
You're, you're moving up.
Applebee's.
Whatever.
You start learning a little more
and your work ethic carries over.
And people are like, oh, oh, this
guy actually does, does stuff.
What's he doing?
Oh, right now he's in the back
learning how to make the tater tots.
Like, well, we don't make the
tater tots all that often.
It's like, well, he's going to,
he's going to know how to do it.
Why?
But you can enjoy the process and
try it out while you're there.
If you're into cars, maybe you take
your experience and move to a O'Reilly
auto parts, start working there.
That's a little more aligned with
what you're doing, but your skill
for McDonald's and Applebee's can
now all of a sudden move over to you
working at O'Reilly's Auto Parts.
And at this stage, it
shouldn't be that hard.
The hard part is getting your
mind around the idea that you
are not your circumstance.
You make your circumstance.
You make the circumstantial
reality in your head.
God, that sounded woo woo and weird.
But basically, you're framing
everything the way you want to.
There was a study that I like
to come back to quite often.
And I should have actually
brought this study up.
But the study was based
around hotel workers.
And they had two sets of
identical hotel workers.
And for one group, they got them in
the room before the hotel season or
whatever started, and they got them
in a room and said, Hey, listen,
guys, thank you for working here.
We're glad you're here to help.
Um, it's going to be
a great, great season.
So listen, one thing we found out
is that all the work that you're
doing is actually good exercise.
So make sure you have good shoes,
make sure you're taking care of
yourself, getting plenty of water.
This is good exercise.
Walking up the stairs.
We've heard, we learned from our research
that it burns this many calories.
It does this and you're getting,
you know, you're getting your walk
on, getting all your steps in.
It's actually good for you.
So we want to keep everybody
safe here, but just remember
this job is good for you.
Uh, walking around helps it's healthy.
So.
Even if you have one of the
desk jobs, once in a while, take
some time to walk, whatever.
Thank you very much.
And with that little bit, he
changed the course of their lives
because the other group, when he
talked to, when they brought them
in a room, they talked to 'em.
They were just like, Hey, listen,
uh, it's time for your job.
A siren.
Should I cut that out?
Maybe I should cut that out.
But the other group, they
brought them in the room.
The other hotel workers.
Completely different
crowd of hotel workers.
They told him, Hey, uh, here's your job.
Here's what you need to do.
Get to work.
And basically without giving them
any information that the job was
a health benefit, this group of
workers, when they checked them
again at the end of the season.
had done far worse than the people
who actually were given that pep
talk and were told the information
about the job being healthy for you.
And that was just their framing.
So one group had a frame that this
is good exercise and the second group
had a frame that this is just beating
me down and I'm, I'm dying inside.
They weren't given any kind of prompt.
So whatever they came along, they came in
the room with, that's what they left with.
But that's a powerful example
because most often people don't want
to use what they, what they have.
They don't want to use the present
moment to strengthen themselves,
to, to bolster their creative
ability at any given moment.
They usually just want whatever
silliness they want or whatever,
whatever they're trying to do in general.
Most people just want to exist at a
job jobs become horribly inefficient
and very lazy because most people just
sit up and say, I'm here for the job.
And that's fine.
I don't, I don't, I'm not trying to tell
you, you should love your job in any
certain way, but what's not fine is.
When you're damaging yourself
and you don't have to, if
you're not enjoying your life the
way it is, and it's hard to, I don't
always enjoy my life the way it
is, but I've gotten a lot better.
I'm speaking from someone who came from
a place where hair was falling out,
had a, I don't want to say I was never
getting to the breakdown point, but hair
was falling out, was having headaches,
just terribly frustrated with the day.
And it kept on saying
tomorrow will be better.
If I get to this, if I can just make
it to the, through the week, if I
can, and there's a lot to be said for
looking forward to things, but man,
I had a bad attitude and couldn't
take the present for what it was and
getting a lot better at doing that
will just make you feel so much better.
And I'm not the only one
who said things like this.
If you don't believe that the,
um, the hotel workers felt better
about their jobs, then you may
have missed what I was saying.
When you feel like you're getting good
exercise and you're getting a benefit,
Things just, things just feel better.
There's so much to learn in this world.
So much to create so much to build from
so much to learn so much to experience.
If you're in the car on the
way to Disney world, and you've
got kids and family in the car,
you obviously want to get to Disney world.
That's your destination.
That's where you're going.
But in the moment while you're in
the car, why don't you enjoy that?
Why don't you make that
the best car ride ever?
Why are you putting all your
gratification on getting to Disney
World, when the journey is part of it?
You're driving, you're in the
car, play some games, ask puzzles,
you know, ask some questions.
We used to do crossword puzzles in the
car when I was coming up on road trips.
We'd be driving and my mom would
be in the front seat asking
us, Okay, what are you guys?
And she would just start spitting
out these questions and we would
try to come up with answers.
She did the same thing with jumbles.
My dad would listen to music and he would
try to get us to break apart the music.
He didn't understand
music like my mom did.
Obviously he wasn't a musician.
My mom was, but he would try to
get us to say, Hey, you see, you
see that guitar that's such and
such playing that right there.
It's like, okay.
And we would, we would have fun on the
way because what else are you going to do?
Be sad.
Think about the future
while you're in the car.
Enjoy the ride.
I get what everybody says
about delayed gratification.
And it's so hard to talk about these
topics without somebody getting upset and.
Weird it out.
Like, you can't tell people just to
delay, not to delay gratification.
That's why we end up in the
problems we've got right now.
Like, I don't, I don't
care what you're doing.
If you're saving or spending, enjoy it.
If you have a reason to, if you have
a reason to, uh, save something for
later than do that, but just enjoy it.
Say, yeah, I'm here right
now, but I'm making moves.
I got choices.
I'm moving towards something better.
If you're not happy where you are,
start thinking about ways where
you can use the time and keep your
energy going in the right way.
And if you do have frustrations, which
you will, and if you do have frustrations,
some, some issues, some internal
pushback, use that energy to
find what you can do better.
Start thinking of that better way.
A lot of times our frustrations, our
negative feelings are telling us,
Hey man, we got to find a better way.
We got to do this better.
Got to talk to somebody, got to think
about this differently, got to learn
something, got to build something new,
maybe take a break, I don't know, but
I'm not, I'm not dealing with this.
I'm not feeling it.
That's what your, that's what your
system is usually telling you.
So don't ignore the
negative feelings either.
Take them, embrace them, figure
out what to do with them and
keep going about your business.
But if you're ever driving in that
car on your way to Disney World, on
your way to McDonald's, get what you
can out of the experience, all of it.
Try your best not to get
sucked up into lesser goals.
Let's see, let's see how many, let's see
how long I can scroll through Instagram
and TikTok before my eyes start to bleed.
That's not a, that's not the greatest
of goals, but it's what we will decide
to do instead of engaging with the
moment intentionally, with intention.
So yeah, back to the Stanford
marshmallow experiment, you
know, it was a willpower test.
But it didn't really test
willpower and it was incorrect.
There's a lot to still to be,
there's a lot to still be learned
on the subject of willpower and what
delayed gratification even means.
But ultimately it comes
down to control of self,
want something right away that
there's something wrong with you.
And don't believe that just because
you want something right away.
You build for your future.
You work for your future.
But you live in the now.
And you take your
experience from the past.
But it's all around the present.
And as they say with that corny
line, the reason they call it a
present is because it's a gift.
So use it to your best advantage.
And as you're working through your,
your goals still on my new year's kick.
So as you're still thinking about your
goals, your objectives, aspirations,
trajectory, your strategies,
your tactics, your aspirations.
Your ambitions, your key
performance indicators.
As you're thinking of all this
stuff for 2024, think about
what's happening right, right now.
If something goes wrong,
how will you feel about it?
Yeah, I know it's far away thinking
about December or where you said you
want it to be at the end of the year
or by the summer or in three months.
But how do you feel right now?
Understand the frustrations you're
feeling and do something about them.
Then that doesn't mean
quit going to the gym.
That may mean learn a little more
about what's going on at the gym.
That may not mean, you know, you're
just going to feel great one weekend and
you've got how many more times to do this.
If you go once a week, you
may have 50 more times that
you're going to go to the gym.
Maybe you need to amp
that up a little bit.
Instead of going to the gym 50
times in a year, kick it up to 150.
Go three times a week.
Try out different things,
but enjoy the process.
And there's a lot more to be said
about it, and I'm not going to
talk about it right now, because
that's going to come in some later
episode of Creativity Threads Life.
Really want to thank everybody
for, for keeping up with this.
Um, shout out to threads by the way.
So that's it for this one,
but shout out to threads, man.
Um, a lot of good people on
there talking good information.
It's still a relatively friendly
community as people start to migrate over
from X and people start to try it out.
I start to see a little more
of that, that, that complaining
kind of whining online.
It's not something
pleasant, but it exists.
So if you still wanted to get in on
threads, uh, now it'd be a good time
jumping in, talking to some people,
seeing who you can meet, seeing
who can learn from, I don't know.
Some people are having a
good experience with it.
Some people aren't also the
website, creativity threads, life.
com is up.
It's up and running.
So after I, after I record this here
live, then it goes out to the podcast
streams and archived on that website.
I'm going to be getting
more of the links together.
So the stuff I talk about here will be a
little easier to find and parse through.
Yeah, I'm having fun with this.
If you have any suggestions on where we
should go next for the podcast, let me
know also shout out to shout out to net
net free net freedom, entertainment.
Enterprises.
I'm sorry.
I'm always thinking about entertainment,
but a shout out to Nat Free.
She, uh, she has her own podcast,
the successful, but single
podcast, doing good things, having
good discussions over there.
And she's keeping me on my toes.
You always got to have somebody
to keep you on your toes.
Let's see what else is
going on in the news.
Uh, Elon is talking about taking TikTok
into bringing a TikTok style video
first format into threads right now.
I mean, pfft, into X right now.
We'll see how that plays out.
X has become this sort of, I don't
know, it's in a weird place right
now, but they're doing video first and
offering all these deals to people.
So, Don Lemon, Jim Rome, they
have TV shows or streaming
video shows on the platform now.
So, it's going to be interesting.
We'll see how it all plays out.
They did pretty well with Twitter Spaces.
And what else do they have on there?
They have AI integration.
They're making it more of a paid platform.
Idea is cool, but still got a lot of
problems, especially on the social front.
So we'll see how all that plays out.
We'll definitely keep you
up to date on that one.
If you want to know more about my
thoughts on like what's going on with.
Technology and things like that.
You may want to jump into that
show versus business podcast, but
let's see what else they're up to.
We all know Elon's on his own little kick.
So
we were here talking about, uh,
yeah, that was the other person.
Tulsi Gabbard was the other person
who got a show on, on Elon's platform.
Not sure how that's going to last.
Not sure.
It's a very weird mix, man.
There's so many right wing and far right
extremists on, on Twitter right now.
And the left wing people who are on
Twitter are, who are still there, are
kind of unbearable in their own ways.
It's just becoming a very
hard place to, to exist.
But I'm still on there, so if you want to
ping me something, you know, I'm on X2.
Also, there's in this comic book,
uh, Amazon's still pushing forward
making comic book adaptations,
bringing them to live action.
They got this one coming
out called, what is it?
And it's by Ed Brubaker.
So that whole series has been picked up.
And if you haven't noticed, uh, what
they're doing, I think it's kind of cool.
Amazon started out with books.
So they have all these ties to the
book and publishing industries.
So that obviously spills into
comic books and graphic novels.
What they're doing now, have been doing
for a long time is taking all these
books and making adaptations of them.
And bringing them into live action
as Amazon originals, because they've
got the whole book connection.
So they're just leaning on that.
A lot of the people who really rock
with Amazon buy a lot of books.
So now you have a situation
where they're taking that book
knowledge and that book skill.
I mean, not the book skill, but they're
taking all of their, um, their, their
previous market of book lovers and
bringing them into the live action world.
Like, Hey, listen, we know you read all
these books and you like X, Y, and Z.
How about you watch this book
adaptation done in live action?
I was like, Oh, that's cool.
It's like, yeah, no, we're Amazon.
We're big like that.
So that's going on there.
Um,
just seeing, uh, just going through
the news here and you know what?
I don't know.
I thought I'd tried putting
news and stuff at the end.
Maybe I'll do some sort of viewer mail.
I'll start commenting on people's,
people's posts and any interactions I get.
Hey, I got a response from
Johnny cupcakes back on threads.
It's another thing about threads
is it's still pretty small.
So what you can do is when, when anybody
big on their post up, They start posting
some pictures or images or whatever.
And it doesn't get a lot
of likes and replies.
It just may mean that people aren't
connected with that brand on threads or
that person on threads or that company.
So what that means is you can get,
you have an opportunity to jump
in there and say, Hey, they're
trying out this new platform.
Let me go talk to them
while nobody else is.
I don't know if you've ever seen
like a book signing or something
that didn't get marketed properly or.
You've been to an event and you're
like the only one backstage and they'll
spend all their time talking to you.
You can do the same thing with
these social media platforms.
If you find somebody large, who's
not getting a lot of replies and
comments, you can jump in there.
And start interacting with
these large, um, individuals.
I remember one time I used to
work really late at night and was
talking to DJ Wu kid, 50 cents.
DJ started talking to him online
and he was over in Greece.
So nobody was up when he was up
on, on Twitter talking noise.
So I was just like,
Hey, let me talk to him.
I started talking to him
and it was like, boom.
Just like that.
So it's pretty cool how
accessible these people are.
But yeah, shout out to Johnny Cupcakes,
shout out to Shanti T, shout out to,
let's see who else, or just Shanti.
I'm sorry, just underscore Shanti.
I'm sorry I was thinking
about somebody else.
Shout out to John Loomer,
Asami Makes, always with the likes
and the comments and the voice notes.
Shout out to Slim YKB, Dented Printer.
Shout out to I am,
I am a Shelton.
I am a Shelton.
Okay.
Uh, maybe I'm saying that wrong.
Shout out to The Solo Artist.
This is Nikki S, Nikki Saunders.
She's out there.
All kinds of cool people on Threads, man.
So we're gonna keep this going.
As I said, hard cap at an hour.
This is going good.
Thanks for all for joining us.
Don't forget, check us out on Apple
Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, and if
you don't deal with the podcast apps, you
can check us out on CreativityThreadsLife.
com.
More later, comment, and
I'll get back at you.
Peace.