Cantonese Practice: Le Petit Prince 22 - 23

Cantonese Practice: Le Petit Prince 21

 

Hidden Brain: The Paradox of Pleasure

According to this two-part program (1, 2) basically if you're getting the constant dopamine that a modern person receives, our homeostasis will naturally baseline us in a state of depression. So if you want to not be depressed, you have to pretty actively not live like a modern person (e.g., no internet at home).

 There are so many good nuggets but here were two that I remember:

"In our narcissistic culture, you'll find people want to escape themselves and into something else. We are so inundated with thinking and worrying about ourselves that our escapism shows we want relief from that."

"I thought I was unhappy because my life was hard. It turns out I was unhappy because my life was too easy."

I'm rethinking my relationship with the internet and consumerism, down to things that we typically think are mundane and basic like "listening" to music (and podcast consumption!) I'm already cranky thinking about the withdrawal that will happen without my Youtube crutch, but the program convinced me there is no end to the manufactured infinite quantity of novelty, and each hit digs deeper into the dopamine cache that cannot be satisfied.