May 9, 2025.
The New Drug We Don’t Talk About
It doesn’t come in a colourful pill or a mysterious powder, but the vice-like grip of instant gratification scarily resembles the drugs our parents warned us about. Instant gratification is commandeering our brain’s reward system and steering us away from lasting satisfaction in our lives—we’re losing the ability to be patient, to sit with boredom, and to put in any real effort in our actions as this “drug” trains us to expect instant rewards whenever we want them.
Thumb-Tapping Toddlers
Everything we could possibly need is quite literally at our fingertips — a few taps of our lazy thumbs and we can summon a meal, meaningless sex, or a movie to veg out to. We’ve become about as patient as tantrum-throwing toddlers, wanting everything now. God forbid the TV takes a little longer to load our series, or our takeaway food is delayed a couple of minutes. We are morphing into lazy and easily irked individuals that appear not to have grown up properly.
No wonder we struggle to put time and effort into everyday tasks when everything from a quick freezer meal to mindless entertainment is only a minute away. Having figured out the quick fixes to our unpleasant emotions, we are now entirely avoiding them while popping something vaguely edible into the microwave or numbing our brain on TikTok, knowing it will make us feel good momentarily. But these instant highs are having some detrimental side effects that we may not even realise.
The Illusion of Efficiency
When we’re in the thick of chasing instant highs, we don’t realise that we think is efficient is actually just the easy way out— and gives us only short-lived reprieve from these emotions we’re avoiding.
The instant highs from phone notifications, social media scrolling, processed food, online shopping and the like has a profound impact on our biological programming. They signal our bodies to release the feel-good hormone, dopamine, in short, fast bursts that are unnatural and unsustainable. Our bodies are designed to produce these hormones in response to certain activities— like exercise, intimacy, being in nature, and reaching our goals—but in today’s fast-paced world, these are being pushed aside for the easier options. Why build something slowly when you can chase an instant high?
Artificial Highs, Real Consequences
The instant highs created from Instagram likes, Tinder matches, UberEats meals etc, are giving us brief bursts of pleasure that feel good in the moment but prevent our bodies from utilising its natural reward-system. As a result, we resort to chasing more instant highs as we forget how to feel good without them.
Over time, our attention spans shrink, and we are unable to find satisfaction in the challenging, fulfilling tasks such as finishing a good book, learning a new skill, and exercising consistently. As a result, we become restless, anxious, and increasingly disconnected from lasting joy.
How It’s Changing Our Lives
The instant gratification epidemic is also affecting the way we act. We seem to believe that minimal effort can still produce maximum results, and our health, relationships and personal lives are taking a hit.
Our addiction to fast fixes impacts the choices we make throughout our day and often denies us the opportunity to grow within ourselves, as well as cultivate strong connections around us. How often have we cancelled plans last minute because it’s easier to stay home or avoided a tough conversation because it’s easier to stay silent. These small decisions feel better in the moment but aren’t resulting in any long-term satisfaction. We’re meant to go through difficult moments, to feel the full spectrum of human emotions and to learn how to grow. We can’t do any of this if we’re choosing comfort and ease over depth, resilience, and real connection.
Imagine Life Without the Scroll
Why do we keep opting for comfort and ease? Well, technology is without a doubt a key player in this instant gratification / dopamine addiction that is altering the way we act and feel. If our phones disappeared tomorrow, we’d experience the world in a completely different way—we wouldn’t be able to take shortcuts through challenging times, or source quick highs online. We wouldn’t be flooding our nervous systems with constant notifications, games, and distractions all day. We’d pick up a book, walk outside, and talk to our families. We’d build things. Cook. Draw. Create. All activities that nurture lasting joy and strengthen our sense of self and meaning in the world. We’ve been settling for scrolling, tapping, sitting, and suffering, when life is about adventuring, laughing, exploring, and loving. We’ve traded creation for consumption—and wonder why we feel empty.
How to Break the Cycle
To free ourselves from the belief that the quick fix is the better option, we need to slow our lives down a little. We need to remember how to put time and effort into our actions and behaviours, and accept that unpleasant emotions are normal. We can’t run from boredom, frustration, or sadness and the short dopamine hits we’ve become so accustomed to are not going to hide these emotions forever.
We need to start focusing on accepting our emotions instead of hiding from them, and investing time and effort into building long term happiness and fulfilment.
Build a Better Reward System
We are all capable of rewiring our brains to sit and work through unpleasant emotions and prioritise slow dopamine once more. Instead of trying to make ourselves feel better by splurging on material things, scrolling on our phones or ignoring our problems, we can start to focus on long-term fulfilment by addressing our issues and emotions, and participating in activities that produce natural highs and lasting happiness.
Let’s save for that trip we’ve always dreamed of, cook that nutritious meal that takes a couple of hours, read that book that will challenge our way of thinking or have that difficult conversation that will lead to a solution.
Let’s start experiencing our life in all its capacity, instead of simply existing in it.