Undoubtedly, teachers remain at the forefront of implementing rural education. This indicates the significant impact their job involvement has on the overall achievements of schools in rural areas. Studies have found that teachers in rural areas often face more difficulties and fewer opportunities in their work. In general, they need a stronger ability to tolerate delay of gratification if they want to have higher job involvement. However, there is currently insufficient research on the impact of career delay of gratification on teachers' job involvement. This study has been conducted to explore the relationship between the delay of gratification and the level of job involvement among physical education (PE) teachers in rural areas, as well as the mediating effect of job satisfaction. 530 PE teachers in the rural areas of Hunan Province, China, have been selected through random sampling as the participants of this study. They have been required to anonymously fill in a Delay of Gratification Scale, Job Involvement Scale and Job Satisfaction Scale to collect the data for investigation and analysis. The study found positive correlations among delay of gratification, job satisfaction, and job involvement among PE teachers in rural areas (P < 0.01), with job satisfaction playing a partial mediating role and intervening variable in the relationship between delay of gratification and job involvement (P < 0.01). Ultimately, delays in gratification directly and, through job satisfaction, indirectly promotes the job involvement of the teachers. The findings of this study reveal the impacts of delaying gratification on the job involvement of PE teachers in rural areas and provide a theoretical basis for increasing the job involvement of PE teachers in rural areas. Rural PE teacher; Education in rural; Career planning; Career development; Work enthusiasm