It seems that some activities are predicated on the belief in a later “payoff”, while others are not.
It’s easy to get confused about payoffs, and to find ourselves trapped (acting as if we are) chasing some payoff, when the supposed payoff can’t plausible exist, or at least not in the size or form that we allow ourselves to believe.
For example, beating a video game doesn’t provide a large pay-off, at least for me. But it’s easy to catch myself acting as though a non-trivial emotional reward is waiting at the end, and to forget that the moment-by-moment experience is the valuable thing.
Bertrand Russell once made a comment about how giving up hope for certain knowledge played a role in overcoming his unhappiness. I wonder how many people here can relate to this. I’ve often felt an essentially unpleasant compulsion to fully refute some skeptical possibility or resolve some intractable philosophic problem. Realizing that the exact emotional feeling of resolution I was seeking was unobtainable was a tremendous relief to me.
Another class of problems involves taking a genuine payoff and exaggerating its size or extending its domain. It’s perfectly reasonable to want to get rich or have success in a competitive career. But it’s just not going to have more than a moderate impact on most areas of your emotional life, (relative to having a typical amount of money or success). A good romantic relationship is hugely rewarding, but you can’t expect it to fix the whole litany of emotional problems you might have.
I’m listening to some recording of Alan Watts. No rationalist he! But he understands certain quirks in the psychology of people who are searching for spiritual insight: He argues that demanding spiritual practices function as reductio ad absurdumm to get people to accept that this whole “climb and mountain and unlock the door” model of enlightenment is wrong. Likewise, there’s a small thread in most moral traditions that says “virtue is actually easier than non-virtue”.
It seems that some activities are predicated on the belief in a later “payoff”, while others are not.
It’s easy to get confused about payoffs, and to find ourselves trapped (acting as if we are) chasing some payoff, when the supposed payoff can’t plausible exist, or at least not in the size or form that we allow ourselves to believe.
For example, beating a video game doesn’t provide a large pay-off, at least for me. But it’s easy to catch myself acting as though a non-trivial emotional reward is waiting at the end, and to forget that the moment-by-moment experience is the valuable thing.
Bertrand Russell once made a comment about how giving up hope for certain knowledge played a role in overcoming his unhappiness. I wonder how many people here can relate to this. I’ve often felt an essentially unpleasant compulsion to fully refute some skeptical possibility or resolve some intractable philosophic problem. Realizing that the exact emotional feeling of resolution I was seeking was unobtainable was a tremendous relief to me.
Another class of problems involves taking a genuine payoff and exaggerating its size or extending its domain. It’s perfectly reasonable to want to get rich or have success in a competitive career. But it’s just not going to have more than a moderate impact on most areas of your emotional life, (relative to having a typical amount of money or success). A good romantic relationship is hugely rewarding, but you can’t expect it to fix the whole litany of emotional problems you might have.
I’m listening to some recording of Alan Watts. No rationalist he! But he understands certain quirks in the psychology of people who are searching for spiritual insight: He argues that demanding spiritual practices function as reductio ad absurdumm to get people to accept that this whole “climb and mountain and unlock the door” model of enlightenment is wrong. Likewise, there’s a small thread in most moral traditions that says “virtue is actually easier than non-virtue”.