week 5 
9/19/16 - 9/25/16

Tim Urban - Inside the mind of a master procrastinator

This is hands down my favorite Ted talk up to date! It is also the most relevant - I have known this instant gratification monkey for a very long time - honestly, as long as I can remember. While I like to think that over the past few years I have taken some strides in learning to control my impulses and yield to the rational thinking part of my brain, this is still as relevant as ever. Like that evil monkey in Family Guy that keeps bothering Chris, my monkey shows up periodically to offer endless trivia and more often than not on Sunday nights..lol :) Despite the fact that  by now I've developed some stamina through life lessons on importance of discipline, I still tend to procrastinate more often than not. And it really is about time to get it together - if not for anything else, at least for a better sleep cycle. >.< 

The best part of this talk is how incredibly relatable it is! Tim Urban has reached Einstein level of relativity here - adult life requires that we learn to let the rational brain drive our actions for the purpose delayed gratification instead of allowing the instant gratification monkey to distract us and consequently keep us from making progress. And ironically, the instant gratification monkey ultimately ends up delaying our big-picture/ rationally understood, wanted, and planned gratification! Who doesn't know the oh-too-familiar sense of shame and guilt and everything else that comes along with knowing you are the ultimate source of your own problems.?! haha =D

It's essentially a rite of passage that Jean Piaget studied conceptualized as a four stage series of cognitive development. As he proposed, from ages 7 to 11 we enter the Concrete Operations period of the development of our  ability to think and understand. the Concrete operations period is significant and distinct turning point of our development when we begin to understand the nature of cause and effect relationships and how it relates and then ultimately runs our lives. I don't think it's even possible to fully quiet the instant gratification monkey - its a inseparable part of our nature, the Freudian "Id". Nonetheless, as we progress through natural order or cognitive development, we begin to develop our own unique strategies for quieting that mischievous little monkey.  So here's hoping that Next semester, I Will finally do my work as it becomes assigned instead of relying on the "been there/done that" ways! :)