What happened to waiting?
In the age of digital media, everything happens instantaneously.
Want to listen to a new album that your favorite artist released? Just look it up on Spotify. Heard there was a new movie out that seems interesting? Stream it on Netflix. Trying to get in contact with loved ones? Just send them a text.
Our screens buffering and not letting a YouTube video begin feels like the end of the world; we’ve become incapable of having patience.
But why are we incapable of waiting for a few days or hours and instead seek instant gratification?
Some, like myself, find joy in waiting. The buildup is oftentimes more exciting than the end result. For example, during the holiday season, the excitement and holiday spirit are way more exciting than the holiday itself. However, it would be impossible to say that at some point you haven’t wanted a present under the tree immediately — rather than having to wait a whole month.
According to an article published in Psychology Today in 2019, every time we reach for this instant gratification, “our brain pathways for those actions are reinforced and strengthened, making it easier to fall into the same patterns the next time around and harder to break the cycle.”
Many in our generation fall prey to this; we see something on our phones and want it immediately. We don’t think about it, we rarely sleep on it and we don’t consider how it may impact us further down the road. We just want. Immediately.
This also applies to the accessibility of those around us. It used to be that if you wanted to get ahold of someone, you had to call, and if they weren’t home, you had to call again or wait for them to call you back. Now, we can text someone, and because of our penchant for always having our phones, we can get a response in minutes or even seconds.
All this is not to say that you should take days to answer your friends or listen to an album. Our generation is very lucky that we have the ability to access everything at once. Just take a minute to pause and find the art and the joy of waiting.
Lauren Douda is a freshman secondary education and English major from Lexington, South Carolina. Lauren can be reached at [email protected].
