24 Jan 2026 · 5:05
Now or later? Why We Sacrifice the Future for Today
Temporal discounting
Why can a smaller reward right now feel more tempting than a bigger reward we have to wait for?
In this episode of Circuit Breaker: Rewiring Your Decisions, we explore Temporal Discounting — the tendency to place less value on rewards the further away they are in time. We look at why immediate gratification can outweigh future benefits, even when waiting may lead to a better outcome.
But why is the future so easy to undervalue when the present is right in front of us? Discover how Temporal Discounting shapes our everyday choices, influences our long-term goals, and reveals the challenge of choosing what we want most over what we want now.