This Is Us
The Difference Between Self-Discipline and Self-Denial
Why some of us can’t bear to use the beautiful things we own
I just learned the word “anhedonia.” It means the inability to experience pleasure. Writers have been using the term a lot recently (15,700 results came up when I searched for it in Google News) to describe one of Covid’s long term effects on mental health. Over the weekend, I came across anhedonia in a New York Times article, which linked it to another good vocab word: anosmia, or the loss of smell.
Smell is intimately tied to both taste and appetite, and anosmia often robs people of the pleasure of eating. But the sudden absence also may have a profound impact on mood and quality of life. Studies have linked anosmia to social isolation and anhedonia, an inability to feel pleasure, as well as a strange sense of detachment and isolation.
I definitely don’t have anhedonia. But the word has led me to mull over a related attribute that I’d always considered a strength: The ability to delay pleasure or gratification. Let’s call it self-discipline. You’re likely familiar with the Marshmallow Test, the 1972 psychological experiment by psychologist Walter Mischel, which measured how long preschoolers could keep from scarfing down marshmallows placed in front of…
