Doctor Jordan Peterson said it best on a recent podcast, "every relationship in our lives is a sacrificial relationship."
What he meant in saying this is that every relationship we have with another person or some thing in our lives, requires some form of sacrifice for for long term benefits.
In other words, giving up the short term gratification for the long term benefit.
I sat and thought about this quote for some time and I realize that just about everything we have in our lives requires some sort of sacrifice.
Whether it be a relationship with a loving partner, or your relationship with your own fitness and getting in good shape, it is going to require a sacrifice of short term gratication for long term results.
When it comes to getting in good physical shape, just about everyone knows that you aren't going to wake up one day and be in great shape because it requires a consistent effort and discipline to show up everyday and continue to work for your results.
You have to be able to delay short term gratification when it comes to getting in shape because getting in shape takes time and effort over a long enough time horizon.
When it comes to sacrificing in relationships, one must be able to give up simple short-term desires such as sex and attention for the long term benefit of committing to someone else.
The ability to delay gratification gives you a long term reward because it gives you something to work towards and continue to work towards.
Delaying gratification is one of the single most important qualities for a person to have because if you can delay gratification, then you understand that things worth having take time, patience, and effort.
If things come easy for you, you often do not see them as being valuable and this is why short-term pleasure never brings true fulfillment in life.
This is especially true when it comes to modern day dating and hookup culture.
Today, more people are worried about hooking up, dating as many people as possible, getting as much attention as possible and often end up desperate.
Modern culture has programmed humans to develop these narcissistic and psychopathic tendencies that we see a lot of people chasing pleasure possess.
Everything about social media and modern day technology has been designed to make our lives easier and as I stated above, things that come easy are not worth having.
Things like social media and dating apps are designed to program people to give into short term gratification and develop narcissistic and psychopathic traits.
Think about it - the dopamine spikes people get from likes, comments, DMs, and swiping on dating apps are all giving in to the short term gratification that most people are seeking.
I know some people may be thinking that this is just how you meet people in the modern world but I would argue that it simply isn't true.
Sure, social media helps with networking with people you have never met before etc.
But when you think about it in terms of dating or finding people to be genuine friends with, as soon it doesn't work out with someone, you're right back on the dating app looking for the next, and the next, and the next until you no longer feel anything from anyone because you have exceeded your limit in terms of seeking pleasure and short term gratification.
Think of pleasure as a drug - when you take drugs, it starts off small and you build a tolerance to where you need more, to the point where you need that drug just to not feel like shit, to the point where you need the drug to function and you don't even feel the high anymore.
It works the exact same way with pleasure because like drugs, it is replacing a feeling with short term gratification.
This is why anything worth having is going to require some sort of sacrifice, whether it be a partner, your dream body, your career etc.
You must be willing to sacrifice the short-term gratification for long term benefit if you wish to live a fulfilling life.
I can tell you personally that when I first made goals for myself to get into shape, I knew it wasn't going to happen overnight and I would be stupid to ever think that it would happen overnight.
I knew that the only way I was going to look the way that I wanted to was by being disciplined over a long enough period of time and I would eventually be rewarded of the fruits of my labor.
Chasing pleasure and short term gratification is exactly what develops narcissism and psychopathy.
This is often why people who sleep around, serial date, or talk to multiple people at one time often develop narcissism and psychopathic tendencies.
I have learned through my life experience that chasing simple desires such as sex, morally and physically drives you further away from the truth.
I have been in the position before to where I had to pretend to be someone I am not because I was representing something larger than myself, which I am grateful for because these experiences gave me much of the mental clarity that I have today.
But I also knew that by me not being true myself and being truly authentic that I was never going to be truly fulfilled in life.
I have experienced short-term gratification and it is nothing short of a waste of time, especially when life is long.
Sure, I have simple desires just like any other human, but I have learned to control them so that I can stay focused on my long term mission.
I have no time to waste on anyone or anything that is going to stand in the way of me and my long-term mission in life.
Delaying gratification is one of the most important traits that I have learned to be useful and for someone to be able to bring genuine value to others.
We live in a world where people are more desperate, narcissistic, and psychopathic than ever because they want everything right this minute.
More people are desperate to find love so they market themselves on social media and dating apps looking for short-term pleasure, instead of building their value.
More people are desperate to get in shape so they buy that "fat loss" supplement instead of dieting and going to the gym for a couple of years.
The fact is, people want everything right now because they feel like if they do not get it now, they are never going to have it.
This is why narcissists date or sleep around, searching for a husband or wife, instead of working to build their value - they lack the ability to sacrifice.
It is the sacrifice of the short-term that genuinely brings out the value in beauty in things worth having.
Being able to commit to one person and one person only for the rest of your life is sacrificing sex and attention from others now to be with one person forever.
This is how people find fulfillment.
People do not find fulfillment being desperate on dating apps, or talking and sleeping with a bunch of people - they just develop psychopathic qualities and poor behavior.
People find fulfillment in the pursuit of something more, and it is the pursuit that is worth living for, not chasing what you want right this minute because you feel like you deserve it.