We all have our pleasure points. No matter whatever you are, there are things you cannot resist at any part of the time. We keep on doing that day in and day out. Still we dont get over the allure of the habit. Like coffee for me. For some it is songs, for others it may be books.
But why we do it. Why we keep on repeating an activity.
Ok let us go one step still down. What is happiness. What is the physiological composition and psycho neurotic symptoms of happiness. The little hypothalamus ? pituitary, overactive ?
Now the essential point here, is whatever is your mode of deriving happiness, happiness results in the following changes in you:
It results in a “high”. Whether you drink or debauch or lose yourself in the world of letters, you need to get a “high”. Otherwise it is not happiness. Nobody would be happy going to temples, right ? or eating pazhaya soru repetitively ?
Second you drop all your guard and lose yourself. It is the self forgetfulness that gives the unique relief spirit and high.
Repetitive
One unfailing characteristic psychologists ascribe to pleasure seeking behaviour is repetition. A man who derives his pleasurable moments from alcohol, goes back to it, at the drop of the hat. Not as though alcohol and cannabis are the only ones that induce addiction. Happiness as a set of physiological and psychological (neuron stimulators) actions and reactions, equally is addictive. Alcohol and cannabis add their own chemical receptors to the normal repetitive behaviour.
Now an aside.
Society, in its infinite wisdom, calculated that certain activities are conducive to its continued existence and some are not. The acts non grata were frowned upon and good ones appreciated. Society did so for its own reason. For nothing other than self perpetuation. At times.
Nevertheless, it never as a whole attempted to deny pleasure seeking. Again, almost all religions seem to discourage this type of behaviour.
Learning to love
The man is an informed, enlightened and learning animal. He as a child, cautiously takes his first steps into a pleasure. Slowly he realizes that it will not be frowned upon. No matter what the society says, the parents set the tone. And the child follows the parents. Mostly.
Then the behaviour is repeated in various spheres and the child experiments with everything to see that the particular receptors are aroused by each activity. Those arouse it are repeated. Those did not, are not repeated.
Now instead of music, or book reading or sports as a pleasure seeking activity, the pleasure seeking as a habit sets in. Whatever the young man does, he expects pleasure.
But not to be
Life is a mixture. Because it is life. Let us not theorise it one way or other. Simply because of competition. So, there are failures. When an anticipated pleasurable activity cannot be engaged, when something or someone spoils the pleasure, pain results.
Pain hurts. Not because it is pain. It hurts because it is not pleasure. We are used to and addicted to the extra hypothalamus activity called pleasure. We expect that at every nooky and cornery. As if it is a pizza we have ordered.
So, whenever you encounter pain, you deny it is some kind of pleasure. It is a stepping stone to pleasure. It is a lesson. It is a blah blah blah. You reassue yourself that the next time it will be better luck.
So, pain does not reduce your addiction. It increases it.
Serious theory
You stayed and read so far. It is a surprise. I am sure, anyone like you will finish this piece.
What these cycle of pain and pleasure deny us, is the vision of reality. Through our craving for pleasure, we mistake trees for woods. We misestimate and go on blundering. We do not see the disaster coming. Like an indefatigable gambler, we do not stop till we lose the shirt on the back.
So if you trace your life back at a particular point of time, you will realize that at no point, you had clear vision. Every time, something or someone clouded your imagination. You reacted. Never acted on your own.
You can take any number of calamities happened to you or to your friends or to characters you read. They fall into this needless unintelligent imaginations and reactions to circumstances.
The cure
Failure results from the blind man’s coloured vision. How do you see for real.
A long and hard gaze? There is no time to do that.
An analysis of all the pros and cons and then answer. Like Albert Einstein.
Don’t worry you will never get that time. Albert was considered a dunce by his maths teacher.
The only cure is to keep your mind above water, so to say. To keep it at a height, so that you are able to recognize your own errant behaviour and pull back the strings in time. It is not enough to forbid yourself from drinking alcohol; that immediately creates a craving. So you fill that void by some other benign pleasure. It is “atmani atmaneyava thushta” the pleasure derived by your soul from itself.
The deep meditative state takes you to an inner calm and you seem to be rejoicing in it. You seem to be not to come out of it. You want to continue to do it. Once practiced, you can do it anywhere.
Remember concentration is a function of your desire. In a crowded room where everyone is shouting at the top of their voices, you would not take your eyes off the screen if tendulkar is bowled clean out in a critical juncture of Indian innings. At that point, shouts, inviting food, your own popcorn is no match, cannot restrain or sway your concentration.
So, when you meditate, and meditate and derive pleasure you gain a vantage point, and you develop a distaste for these other pleasures. If you have to engage in any such activity, you engage in it, like a matured man engaging in a child’s play. Not emotional and hence super efficient.
In this concept, there is no God, eight handed four headed etc. There is no reincarnation. There is no soul. A very simple age old, withered concept of demystified, replacement of bad habit with a good habit theory. Now meditate. Wont you ?
But why we do it. Why we keep on repeating an activity.
Ok let us go one step still down. What is happiness. What is the physiological composition and psycho neurotic symptoms of happiness. The little hypothalamus ? pituitary, overactive ?
Now the essential point here, is whatever is your mode of deriving happiness, happiness results in the following changes in you:
It results in a “high”. Whether you drink or debauch or lose yourself in the world of letters, you need to get a “high”. Otherwise it is not happiness. Nobody would be happy going to temples, right ? or eating pazhaya soru repetitively ?
Second you drop all your guard and lose yourself. It is the self forgetfulness that gives the unique relief spirit and high.
Repetitive
One unfailing characteristic psychologists ascribe to pleasure seeking behaviour is repetition. A man who derives his pleasurable moments from alcohol, goes back to it, at the drop of the hat. Not as though alcohol and cannabis are the only ones that induce addiction. Happiness as a set of physiological and psychological (neuron stimulators) actions and reactions, equally is addictive. Alcohol and cannabis add their own chemical receptors to the normal repetitive behaviour.
Now an aside.
Society, in its infinite wisdom, calculated that certain activities are conducive to its continued existence and some are not. The acts non grata were frowned upon and good ones appreciated. Society did so for its own reason. For nothing other than self perpetuation. At times.
Nevertheless, it never as a whole attempted to deny pleasure seeking. Again, almost all religions seem to discourage this type of behaviour.
Learning to love
The man is an informed, enlightened and learning animal. He as a child, cautiously takes his first steps into a pleasure. Slowly he realizes that it will not be frowned upon. No matter what the society says, the parents set the tone. And the child follows the parents. Mostly.
Then the behaviour is repeated in various spheres and the child experiments with everything to see that the particular receptors are aroused by each activity. Those arouse it are repeated. Those did not, are not repeated.
Now instead of music, or book reading or sports as a pleasure seeking activity, the pleasure seeking as a habit sets in. Whatever the young man does, he expects pleasure.
But not to be
Life is a mixture. Because it is life. Let us not theorise it one way or other. Simply because of competition. So, there are failures. When an anticipated pleasurable activity cannot be engaged, when something or someone spoils the pleasure, pain results.
Pain hurts. Not because it is pain. It hurts because it is not pleasure. We are used to and addicted to the extra hypothalamus activity called pleasure. We expect that at every nooky and cornery. As if it is a pizza we have ordered.
So, whenever you encounter pain, you deny it is some kind of pleasure. It is a stepping stone to pleasure. It is a lesson. It is a blah blah blah. You reassue yourself that the next time it will be better luck.
So, pain does not reduce your addiction. It increases it.
Serious theory
You stayed and read so far. It is a surprise. I am sure, anyone like you will finish this piece.
What these cycle of pain and pleasure deny us, is the vision of reality. Through our craving for pleasure, we mistake trees for woods. We misestimate and go on blundering. We do not see the disaster coming. Like an indefatigable gambler, we do not stop till we lose the shirt on the back.
So if you trace your life back at a particular point of time, you will realize that at no point, you had clear vision. Every time, something or someone clouded your imagination. You reacted. Never acted on your own.
You can take any number of calamities happened to you or to your friends or to characters you read. They fall into this needless unintelligent imaginations and reactions to circumstances.
The cure
Failure results from the blind man’s coloured vision. How do you see for real.
A long and hard gaze? There is no time to do that.
An analysis of all the pros and cons and then answer. Like Albert Einstein.
Don’t worry you will never get that time. Albert was considered a dunce by his maths teacher.
The only cure is to keep your mind above water, so to say. To keep it at a height, so that you are able to recognize your own errant behaviour and pull back the strings in time. It is not enough to forbid yourself from drinking alcohol; that immediately creates a craving. So you fill that void by some other benign pleasure. It is “atmani atmaneyava thushta” the pleasure derived by your soul from itself.
The deep meditative state takes you to an inner calm and you seem to be rejoicing in it. You seem to be not to come out of it. You want to continue to do it. Once practiced, you can do it anywhere.
Remember concentration is a function of your desire. In a crowded room where everyone is shouting at the top of their voices, you would not take your eyes off the screen if tendulkar is bowled clean out in a critical juncture of Indian innings. At that point, shouts, inviting food, your own popcorn is no match, cannot restrain or sway your concentration.
So, when you meditate, and meditate and derive pleasure you gain a vantage point, and you develop a distaste for these other pleasures. If you have to engage in any such activity, you engage in it, like a matured man engaging in a child’s play. Not emotional and hence super efficient.
In this concept, there is no God, eight handed four headed etc. There is no reincarnation. There is no soul. A very simple age old, withered concept of demystified, replacement of bad habit with a good habit theory. Now meditate. Wont you ?
