Welcome to 10 minute Bible Talks.

Where we connect the Bible to your life in the time it takes to get to work.

I'm Tanya Wilmoth. So in the 60s a Stanford psychology professor conducted an

experiment that's referred to as the marshmallow test and it's been done

several times since then but it's basically the same.

So the psychologist puts a marshmallow in front of a three-year-old, tells them the marshmallow is theirs,

and they can eat it any time they want.

But if they can wait 10 minutes without

eating it, they will get a second better treat to enjoy at the end. So the

original test earned recognition as a pretty powerful

predictor of future performance. So compared to kids who lunged for the

early reward, those who held out for a bigger prize, they did better in school, got higher SAT scores, had higher

self-esteem, better coping skills, and were even less likely to abuse drugs. What psychologists think those kids can do, even at the age of three,

is hold two ideas in tension at the same time. What are those two ideas?

Well, it's pretty simple.

I want the treat.

I can wait for a better treat.

How most college students and most adults can't even do that, but the ability to hold

attention longer tends to pay off for us in the long run. As parents, we might

already be discouraged, but what can we do?

Well, we can help our kids practice holding these two ideas in tension.

I want this now. I can wait for something better.

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