Jonathan Sacks Quotes

By definition, saving - for anything - requires us to not get things now so that we can get bigger ones later. That's hard. Our brains are hard wired to prefer the here and now.

Procrastination is like a credit card: it's a lot of fun until you get the bill.

Years of happiness can be lost in the foolish gratification of a momentary desire for pleasure.

I don't think patience is something that any of us grow up with in a large dose. It's a world of instant gratification.

The young child needs not only gratification; he needs also to learn the limitations that the physical world puts upon his gratifications

No one wants to be patient. No one wants to wait for anything. They want it right now - that instant gratification.

We are prone to seek immediate pleasure or good, however small, rather than remote pleasure or good, however vast.

I am an incredibly impatient person.

Immaturity is the inability to delay self gratification.

There is no use if knowledge grows while desires multiply. It makes one a hero in words and a zero in action.

When we can see an immediate payoff, we are more likely to change our behavior in the moment. This aligns our daily actions with our long-term interests.

You feel better in the short run when you have a tub of ice cream, but in the long run, you don't.

The intelligent desire self-control; children want candy.

Adults devise a plan and follow it, children do what feels good.

The main reason for people's lack of success is their willingness to give up what they want most of all, for what they want right now!

It is clear that men accept an immediate pain rather than an immediate pleasure, but only because they expect a greater pleasure in the future. Often the pleasure is illusory, but their error in calculation is no refutation of the rule.

The chief cause of failure and unhappiness is trading what you want most for what you want right now

It's like a child who is used to having ice cream whenever he wants. When it doesn't come when he asks he tends to get confused and nervous.

Giving up on our long-term goals for immediate gratification, my friends, is procrastination.

America's greatest sin is the refusal to delay gratification.

The life of children, as much as that of intemperate men, is wholly governed by their desires.

For the first time, the object of what I want is more important than fulfilling my desires.

My most serious character flaw is that I don't deny myself much.

Do not discourage your children from hoarding, if they have a taste to it; whoever lays up his penny rather than part with it for a cake, at least is not the slave of gross appetite; and shows besides a preference always to be esteemed, of the future to the present moment.

It means being able to resist the urge for immediate gratification and opt for the course of action that will pay off later.