Reality television does more than just entertain us. Many of these shows actually teach us a thing or two about cooking (Food Network’s Chopped, Iron and Master Chef), managing a business (Fox’s Kitchen Nightmares, Food Network’s Restaurant Impossible and Bravo’s Tabatha’s Salon Take Over), and about the challenge of overcoming addiction, like VH1’s Dr. Drew’s Celebrity Rehab, Hoarders, and A&E’s Intervention.
But, is there something to learn from the lives of the women of VH1’s Mob Wives? Apparently, yes. Outside of their mob connections, these “hell on heels” women have to cope with issues of self-esteem, addiction, parenting and relationship, like many people.
Mob Wives (MWs) Season 1 ended with Renee Graziano’s “girls” (MW’s Karen, Carla, and Drita) urging her to return to the dating scene. Renee’s father, Anthony Graziano, and ex-husband, Junior are both mafia members. Anthony was a high ranking member of La Cosa Nostra according to the Federal Government and is currently serving time in North Carolina. Renee’s ex-husband Junior was arrested in January of 2011 in the largest mafia bust in New York City’s history
Mob Wives Season 2 opened with Renee Graziano getting a complete plastic surgery body makeover to help her to feel more attractive and desirable to the opposite sex. Shortly, after surgery, Renee’s stitches in her back ripped open. She was rushed to the ER and lost 6.3 pints of blood. “I knew something was wrong,” she admits. “I felt my life slipping. I felt everything drain out of my body. I knew I was dying.” Renee’s battle to stay alive required a 16-day hospital stay.
Why did Renee choose plastic surgery instead of diet and exercise to get her body into the shape she desired? “I wanted instant gratification“, she said. Renee wanted to lose 35 Lb “today, not tomorrow”. Unfortunately, she got more than which she had bargained. Her emotional scars rival the scarring from her extensive surgery.
The Psychology of Instant Versus Delayed Gratification
Instant Gratification is the desire to get immediate satisfaction by acting in a certain fashion. You hope to achieve quick happiness and also to relieve the pressure of a need or impulse. All of us give in to a need or impulse at times that may not fit into our long-term goals or be good for us. Just this past holiday, I indulged myself with more sweets than was good for me, resulting in a migraine. Short-term pleasure short-circuited my better judgment.
Instant gratification is a problem when it’s more your mode of operating than a diversion. If you tend to solve more serious problems of physical or mental health, relationship, or finance through a quick fix mindset, you are apt to bring about consequences that negatively affect you in the long-run. This is what Renee Graziano found out.
This also calls to mind the three people who died following a sauna-based spiritual cleansing ceremony that was led by self-help guru Arthur Ray. These persons paid $10,000 dollars to get spiritually-cleansed over a long weekend. Instead, they lost their lives
In contrast, delayed gratification is the ability to weigh the consequences of what feels good at the moment with what benefits you for the future. You have to be able to keep your goals in mind, while considering the risks and benefits of acting in one way versus another.
We know much more today about the thought and emotional processes that give us the ability to weigh the pros and cons of solving a problem for immediate versus delayed reward. Research has found that there are differences in the brain activity of people considering solutions that offer delayed versus instant reward. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) shows that the region of the brain that is involved in planning, imagination, logic and reasoning, and inhibition of impulse (the brain’s frontal lobes) has more active connections to the emotional center of the brain (the brain’s Limbic Structures). The emotional you is able to converse with the reasoning part of you, and vice versa, balancing out your emotions with reason.
For example, I taught myself how to walk away from that pretty dress at Nordstrom that seemed as if it were made just for me. By changing my language, I learned how to create a connection between the emotional and logical me. My emotional brain said, “What a beautiful dress; I’d look good in it. It’s my colors; oh, they only have one of it in my size. I have to buy it now. Never mind that it doesn’t fit into my budget this month. I’ll work it out.”
I changed my language, to resist my impulse. “It will be there tomorrow,” I said. Suddenly, my emotional and reasoning brain started to converse. “There’s always a beautiful dress. You know better than this. Wait until you feel better about buying it.
What did I do that helped me to delay gratification of an impulse? By changing my language, I balanced out the value that I placed on happiness today for happiness tomorrow. The emotional brain wants to spend more than we have, eat that extra dessert, and do whatever else is needed to feel good. While the rational brain says stop and think how this affects your goals and self-esteem in the days that follow.
If you have a tendency toward instant gratification, don’t despair. You can learn how to wait, to control your tendency to jump at a quick fix for your problems. Choose to minimize the bad things that happen to you.
The following will help you to strengthen connections between your emotional and rational brain regions. The next time you want to spend more money than you have, eat that extra dessert, tell off your boss, or get a beauty procedure that poses a risk to your health, you will have tools to cut your impulse off at the pass.
Delay Gratification of Impulse and Reward: Create A Connection Between Your Emotional and Reasoning Brain Parts
- Know When Your Emotions Are Taking You Over. You have to become present to thoughts, feelings and behaviors that alert you to highly charged emotions that may cause you to act impulsively. Black and white, all or nothing statements like, “I want it now; I can’t wait, It will change my life for the better, solve all of my problems; and I can’t live without it are signals that your emotional brain is taking over. You have to acknowledge the emotional scripts that cause you to act impulsively.
- Change Your Language, Diffuse Emotions, and Create a Hookup to Your Rational Mind. Find a statement that you can say to yourself that stops your emotional brain in its tracks. With regard my example about the dress, I made a decision to implement this strategy at some point, and then started to live by it. It worked, for me. You have to find what works for you. Create a rational script that opens up your reasoning process. By changing the language around your need and desire, you diffuse emotions. Now, when your reasoning brain gives you a call, you can hear it! It’s like strengthening a muscle. The more you practice, the greater connections you will form between your emotional and rational brain areas.
- Learn to Value Your Future. People who are inclined to act impulsively have poorly defined goals and values for the future. You have to give your reasoning brain something important to say when it calls on you. Identify your most important goals and values. What you perceive is important to you determines how you act with regard to your problems. It’s easier to act with purpose if you know what is most important to you in the long run. Clarify your values and goals, and then, actively try to live by them.
I hope you enjoyed my post today. There is much to learn from popular culture, if we reflect deeply on it. If you like my post today, please say so by selecting the “Like” button that immediately follows. I welcome your thoughts, experiences, and comments. Warmly, Deborah
