Enjoy Love, Understanding, and Possibly Dancing

Source: Will Clickbait ruin Quora someday?

Here at a Philosophy of Enjoyment there is no clickbait and shrill exclamation points are strictly avoided. Yes! Here there are no broad claims made to sell you something and no “100% Guaranteed If Not Totally Satisfied!”

With a Philosophy of Enjoyment, there are no phony directives. There is no lack of logic and no lame clichés to disenchant you. There is no, “Make All Your Dreams Come True In Three Easy Steps!” Such claims beg questioning: How do you make all your dreams come true? What if your dream is world peace and a low-cost iPhone?

What then?

That, of course, depends. It depends on your philosophy and the love you have. It depends on how you think, feel and behave. If you’re open to it and not afraid to feel silly, enjoyment can be as easy as dancing freely.

People are people. More than a few are goofy, bad and scary. Most of us start off OK—even those despised today—but then we start thinking and reacting in a negative way to a world filled with people who appear cruel, irrational and greedy.

That’s when the trouble started, back on day one.

As Hans Fallada (1893-1947) wrote in Every Man Dies Alone (1946)—later made into the movie Alone in Berlin (2017)—”This boy was three years younger than Karlemann and heading in the same way—no love, no belief, no ambition, only thinking of himself” (p. 340).

The Beatles were right all along: “All You Need Is Love“.

Love is not just the domain of religion. Look at what religious people do! It’s like every self is one and the same, and differences, a matter of opinion. Anyone can be duped by fear, hate or desire, but of course, everyone knows that, don’t they?

It’s a matter of understanding.

Clickbait is prone to hyperbole, as in, a claim that’s “not meant to be taken literally, but used to create dramatic effect” (Seneca Learning).

Exaggeration is used to stir desire so you’ll buy what’s being pitched (10% off if you buy four). Getting you to want something is the sole purpose of advertising and propaganda (not to be confused with soul purpose which is quite different).

Hyperbolic geometry is not an exaggeration.

From the word hyperbole we get the word hyperbolic which is an “exaggerated claim,” that is, unless you’re talking hyperbolic geometry. Exaggerated claims tend to be short-sighted, superficial, misleading, and more than probably, disappointing—especially if you do what’s advised and no dreams are forthcoming.

It’s disappointing when expectations are thwarted by realities beyond our control.

We swim in a world where advertisers and propagandists tell us who we are, what we should be, and what values to share.

Advertising executive Jonas Sachs said this about ads, “We see 3,500 of them a day and the majority of them basically tell us you suck and if you don’t buy this product, you’re not going to be rich enough, smart enough, hot enough, and so we walk around being told 3,500 times a day how deficient and lame we are” (How Commercials Get Us to Buy Crap We Don’t Need).

No wonder people get depressed.

According to these captive audience ads, to be happy, a man needs TV football, alcohol and jewelry (to appease angry partners about TV football and alcohol).

If you watch the News or get caught in the crossfire, it’s even more depressing. There are maniacs in politics who are greedy, hateful and fear-filled who get others who are greedy, hateful and fearful to do their bidding. Without checks and balances, anyone can run amuck for self-focused reasons.

And therein is the problem: Who is this self causing all the problems?

As our natural environment gets trashed for reasons of comfort, convenience and violence, supposedly good people who claim to love others, go ahead and kill and elbow those in their way.

Silly humans. They rage and fight and trash others with words, fists and guns (sometimes with knives).

As nutty old Nietzsche observed in Thus Spake Zarathustra (1883), “You yourself are the worst enemy you can encounter” (Freedom in Thought). This holds true for everybody: good, bad and nutty (including Nietzsche).

Consider your Philosophy of Enjoyment as a way to get away from not enjoying. No need to buy, do, or go anywhere. First, become aware of how one is manipulated by one’s self and others and then: Do nothing. Think, “Nothing is going to bring me down“.

With a Philosophy of Enjoyment we listen to thoughts and feelings like they’re messengers. We don’t deny them. We accept the flow of passing thoughts and feelings and ground our behaviour in reality like the psychiatrist Dr. Shoma Morita (1874-1938) recommended.

“Accept your feelings. Know your purpose. And do what needs to be done,” Shoma Morita.

The goal is to not let one’s ego or “I think” or “I want” or “I feel” run the show. The problem of unhappiness isn’t a matter of alleviating discomfort by ignoring thoughts and feelings. Thoughts and feelings cause problems when not addressed directly. To take action in one’s life is to not be ruled by passing fancies (Morita therapy: 1919 to 1995).

Here with yours truly, with consideration, humour, an open mind and accepting nature, by experimenting with what’s recommended, you can find advice that could change your life—even if that advice is unsolicited.

This is what your unsolicited advice sounds like, The New Yorker.

The goal is to use one’s way of thinking and feeling to understand what’s happening. Through a Philosophy of Enjoyment anyone can avoid conflict to experience beauty, forgiveness and an over-abiding feeling of happiness no matter what the situation.

Happiness comes from our being alive, not from a bag, bottle, needle or store. The goal of it all is to experience a peace of mind which can’t be bought and paid for with any amount of money.

In this philosophy we consider nuance and complexity. A person’s feelings and thoughts tend to exaggerate either the negative or positive consequences of a now-threat (the Russians are coming) or a now-reward (shark fin soup makes me happy).

The primary role of one’s brain is to help one navigate the environment. Threats and rewards fire in different parts of the brain. On a basic level our brains avoid threats and seek reward, “Cortisol makes us see things in black or white, yes or no and leads us to over-assess the level of threat in front of us. From an evolutionary viewpoint, those ancestors that thought “better safe than sorry” presumably lasted a little bit longer” (Threat vs Reward).

Source: “Threat vs Reward“

In the old days before hairdryers, Artificial Intelligence, missiles and fingernail clippers, this orientation was useful for finding food and avoiding being eaten, but in the 21^st century, it creates problems.

And there it is. Watch what you think and feel and don’t do anything to add inflammation. Take the high road. As Dr. Morita said, “Accept your feelings. Know your purpose. And do what needs to be done.” And, when it’s safe, we can dance. And, if you don’t dance, you can enjoy a good song.

On behalf of life, life is all we have. Why not enjoy it?

The Point of Enjoyment 2

As John Steinbeck said in The Winter of Our Discontent, “You know how advice is. You only want it if it agrees with what you wanted to do anyway.” Good one John.

So true.

We might not appreciate advice but we’re free to give it. It’s like everyone is saying, “I want what I want! Is that so wrong?” but the world says, “Sorry. You can’t have that—but… you-can-have-this.” 

And we make do (or we make don’t).

Contrary to what we might think, “If you want to avoid repeating history, it’s best not to try to learn from it” (Science Behind Repeating Mistakes).

When a mistake happens, say, “Forget about it” like Donnie Brasco. Sing “Walk On By” with Dionne Warwick and move on. Like the weeping philosopher Heraclitus said in 469 BC, “Everything flows.” Nothing lasts. We’re all a little disappointed.

We all dance a tango with the world. In moments of dissatisfaction and/or lamentation it’s not surprising that we ask, “What’s the point?” and find the point lacking and/or nonexistent.

The psychologist Tim Carey wrote, “It’s a funny thing about the point… we rarely think about the point except in those situations when we question if there is one. Most people… meander through their days… getting on with the business of living by making their lives be the way they want them to be” (What’s the Point?…).

Carey concludes: “We have no objective, irrefutable, immutable point that drives us all except, perhaps, the point of keeping our worlds in the states we are satisfied with” (…life is the point).

Cue music: Les Baxter “Blue Tango” (1952).

The propensity to keep one’s self satisfied reinforces the Perceptual Control Theory (PCT) which states, “Behaviour is the control of perception,” which means: “we do things to get what we want” (PCT).

Seems like a no-brainer.

As it says on the PCT website, “When things are working normally, the person gets to experience what they want to experience. It is just right—like the perfect cup of coffee or tea… the person compares a ‘standard’—what they want—with what they are experiencing right now—their perception” (PCT).

Our brains measure the difference between what we want—a beautiful day—with what we get—mud slides.

The bigger the discrepancy between what we want and what we get, the more effort we put into reducing that discrepancy.

Rather than change our behaviour we vary our behaviour to control sensory inputs. We do this to feel what we want to feel. We adjust our behaviour until everything is just right. We think we should be able to control our careers, relationships, health, finances and so on. It’s a surprise when we’re told we can’t.

Effort does not guarantee success. We need to understand the difference between thinking and being.

It’s like you’re driving a car. Your purpose is to get where you’re going so you avoid potholes. It’s a negative feedback loop. You turn your steering wheel to cancel the negative effects of potholes to your purpose.

You want things “just right.” If the music is too loud or in some way not just right, you change the music, turn it off, suffer or seek escape.

Carey asks, “What is the point of saying “Good morning”? What is the point of a butterfly bursting from its constricting cocoon and fluttering off to find a flower? What is the point of going to school, of turning up to work on time, of going on holidays, of being kind, of asking for skim instead of full cream milk...” What’s the point of anything, really?

The point is there is no point, but that is the point! Everything has a point but if you don’t see it, it is indeed pointless.

The point is what you make because you’re the one pointing!

We are meaning makers and pointers. We see patterns and make connections. It’s apophenia: the “universal human tendency to attribute meaning to perceived connections or patterns and to seek patterns in random information” (source).

The pointillism of a day in the park might be to relax and enjoy, but if you don’t see the point, you won’t.

We want things we don’t have. We don’t have things we want. When we have things we want, they don’t last. We have expectations and attachments that bind us to how we want things to be.

Like good old Siddhartha Gautama said, suffering is caused by our wish for things to be other than the way they are.

Nobody but you feels your you feeling (see Here’s the Thing). Scientific instruments can show brain activity, but they can’t point to your awareness of you-ness and say, “There it is.” Nor can you prove that you are conscious other than to say you are. Your brain may fire and wire together a sandcastle of self, but your mind controls the firing lines.

As Dr. J. Schwartz said, “The brain puts out the call. The mind decides whether to listen” (see slide presentation). The brain is the only organ that you can change (rewire) with conscious attention.

You decide what is and isn’t important. One person loves old cars, another doesn’t. What’s the point of old cars? Nothing. But to the one who enjoys them there is.

What’s the point of a flower? a tree? a you? 

The point of a flower is to flower. The point of a tree is to tree. The point of you is to you. There’s no point other than to be and do whatever it is and does.

Flowering is for reproduction but to sensory perceptions of a sensitive person there’s more to flowers than anatomy. There is beauty but not everybody gets it (if they did, they would). Points are individual.

If swimming has a point, swim. If laughing has a point, laugh. We have expectations and preferences that we continually compare to the current state of our world. When they match, we’re content. When they don’t, we do something to make it “just right.”

Thoughts are like seeds. A seed (thought) contains a plant (new thought) which gives birth to more seeds containing more plants (thoughts) in a cycle. It’s all very useful but it can remove a person from the real world.

What’s pulling your strings has been fashioned by memories, dreams and conditioning (see: “It’s Not Me…). You need an ego identity, but the trouble with our big brain is that we put ourselves into psychological prisons. Reality is not what we think it is. Reality with a capital R is something else entirely.

Prove it to yourself. When you’re done reading, go outside and experience the world with your senses. It’s like cleaning a window of thought grime. Thoughts come and go as you enjoy a timeless dimension that’s always there but obscured by preoccupations.

Just dance.

Don’t overthink it.

All insides have outsides inside something else. Where does it begin? Where does it end? It doesn’t. It’s all you.

Wherever you go, there you are.

Polarities, Brain Hemispheres and Wisdom

How do you define enjoyment? Dictionary.com defines it as: “1. the act of enjoying. 2. the possession, use or occupancy of anything with satisfaction or pleasure… 3. a particular source of pleasure… 4. Law. the exercise of a right: the enjoyment of an estate.” Synonyms (words that mean the same or nearly the same) for enjoyment include: amusement, fun, gratification, happiness, indulgence, pleasure, recreation, relaxation, thrill…. and antonyms (word opposites) include: depression, dissatisfaction, gloom, pain, sadness, sorrow, unhappiness, woe, work…

We know that enjoyment, pleasure and happiness are peas in a pod, but that doesn’t mean it’s the same for everybody. What makes one person happy might be unimportant to another.

One person enjoys rowing, another doesn’t. It’s a whatever floats your boat kind of thing. Some people feel happy when they get something to satisfy a need. Some say it’s the feeling you get when you reach a goal and some say it’s a feeling of peace or of grace. Some say its the feeling that everything is exactly as it should be.

During WWII people who were about to get bombed (literally) reported feeling that everything was exactly as it should be. They could hear the bomb falling: “This is it. I’m going to die!” and then, suddenly, they get this feeling of perfection.

Suddenly flaws are no longer flaws. A door that never shuts is perfect in its not-shutting; paint chipped is perfectly chipped. What was beautiful is made more so. When the bomb misses, they are glad and have a new sense of things. Similar feelings have been reported in near-death experiences.

Feeling that everything is exactly as it should be is a form of polar thinking. It’s a going togetherness of mutual opposites. Enjoyment (happiness) is the positive polarity and its opposite, unhappiness or despair is the negative polarity. Each reveals through the other and in terms of time, you can’t get out of now. When you get it (wisdom), you get that zing feeling. You are the wire and the current is experience. This is the electricity of life.

Electricity flows either in alternating current (AC) or in direct current (DC). The difference is in the direction of flow. In DC electrons flow forward from negative to positive and in AC electrons switch directions. Think of happiness (enjoyment) and despair holistically. You wouldn’t know right without knowing wrong. You know positive through negative and vice versa. To be wise is to know the unity of polarities. Enjoyment isn’t about pretending its opposite doesn’t exist. You know one through the other. The profound zing is to get both at once.

Polarities are like the hemispheres of the brain. If one dominates, you have a problem. In the book Master and the Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World, author Iain McGilchrist argues that the differing world views of right and left brain have led to a growing conflict in the modern world.

People pursue happiness but it leads to resentment, unhappiness and an explosion of mental illness. The modern world is dominated by the left hemisphere which tends towards fragmented pieces of information in isolation, it favours a machine model and is overly optimistic. The right hemisphere deals with the entity as a whole in a Gestalt (see: Introduction and Divided brain, divided world?). This is the domain of religion, myth, music and art.

One need only look around to see a mechanistic world that is fragmented and out of touch with the big picture. Most people are out of touch with nature. If you feel empty and paranoid, step away from virtual worlds and go real. Get out of your car. Enter on foot.

In The Way of Myth Joseph Campbell said, “Life isn’t meant to be happy. That’s not what it’s all about. It isn’t about lifestyle choices, convenience and a good golf score. Damage is caused by the attitude that life is meant to be happy.” He argues that life is sorrowful and myths are about that. The myths ask us, “Are you affirmative enough with your relationship with life to say, “Yes!” – no matter what?”

As a philosopher of enjoyment, tap into right hemispheric thinking. See the unity and beauty of things exactly as they are from multiple vantage points. Feel the polarities as one. Go into the natural world (when you can) and ride those downs upward. Be affirmative enough with your relationship to life to say, “Yes! No matter what.”