@Jaytee many of us suffer from this, we want "instant gratification". For example, I have to work on my project but my project is weeks/months away from being finished and therefore so is my reward, but if I help someone else, I get my reward now/soon.
For me this usually happens when I set too big goals instead of splitting it into smaller manageable tasks that I can finish in minutes/hours. Also if I have a hard time getting started, I pick the smallest/most fun task, it usually gets the ball rolling.
Using the example @KNietzsche wrote..
This is the Kaïzen theory of the little steps... If you want to go for 1 miles, you first need to do the 1st step, then another and another ! step by step...don't look behind, go forward...and one day, you reach your destination ! There you can say....wow ! I did it !
Basically, if I have to walk 1 mile I'll have 999999 reasons why I can't, not in the mood, my legs hurt, it's too long, and so on but if I have to walk 1 step, that doesn't seem that bad or hard even with all my excuses so I'll take the first step.. Nice, that wasn't that bad.. Now another step.. Awesome! And another step and another.. you get the sense of accomplishment all along the way instead of at the end goal and you keep moving forward. This is why I have 1000 lists, because I love checking items off lists and looking at how far I have come ☺
If you google "instant gratification" there is a lot of information that you can read up on.