Q: I have a problem that I suspect I share with a number of other people. My problem is that I am at times too impulsive.
I once impulsively traded my car in for a new car that I did not need and wondered afterward why I had done that. I have any number of impulsively purchased lottery tickets. I invest money on a whim and most often lose what I invested. I speak up in public meetings when I do not know what I am talking about, and I have been through the wringers with both alcohol and drug abuse.
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My life would be a lot simpler if I could get rid of my impulsiveness. Give me a hint. What can I do?
A: Let me start by giving you the bad news. You cannot get rid of impulsiveness.
That was part of the survival kit our evolutionary ancestors packed with them when they were trudging through the jungles. Should they have met up with a sabre-toothed tiger they would impulsively get the heck out of there.
Fortunately for us, enough of them got away to carry on with the species. They genetically passed on their impulsiveness to us.
The problem is that we no longer live in jungles. We run around highly structured and socially embedded communities. We need a little more than impulsive behaviour if we are to survive. We need to think things out.
Impulsiveness has two problems.
The first is that it encourages a person to act before that same person has all the information he or she needs to make decisions. Have you ever noticed, for example, that the brochure library in a new car dealership seldom has a copy of Consumer’s Reports mixed in with those shiny and very biased brochures describing the car that they are trying to sell? You are not given all the information you need to buy a new car.
The second problem with impulsiveness is that it deals only with life at the moment. It does not think long term. That big, bright, new car you are wanting to buy might have the new car smell at the moment, but five years from now, when it is carrying the battle scars of family life, it will not smell so nice. Neither will it look all that great. Do you think that you will still want it sitting in your garage then or will you be easy prey for another round with an eager sales person encouraging you to impulsively yet again get another new car.
You cannot get rid of impulsiveness. As I said, it is part of your survival gear. But you can control it. The trick is to give yourself a little time before you make final decisions. I once knew a lady who would leave her wallet in the car when she went shopping. Before she could actually buy anything, she would have to walk all the way back to her car to get her debit card to cover the cost. Often as not by the time she got back to the car, and had a few moments to think about it, she changed her mind and chose not to buy whatever it was she otherwise would have impulsively purchased.
It is easy to get extra time to make decisions. One of our more recent prime ministers used to say, “can I get back to you on that,” when he was asked to respond to something or the other. He seldom impulsively quipped a response. Given that extra moment or two, your impulses can be controlled and you can make better and more profitable decisions to guide both yourself and your family.
