The Pursuit Of Happiness Makes Us Sad

[pimpnamedraypeat]

You obviously know nothing about meditation, and then construct an argument based on your ideas, which you think are true because you thought of them. Then you say a bunch of red herrings about Peterson and complain about people quoting thinkers on a forum dedicated to the work of one thinker.

Meditation for 8 hours wouldn't lead to happiness it would lead to homelessness and social isolation. Supposing one could stand the boredom.
Most people would not be happy in such circumstances. But supposing one is a trustfund kid with a unique temperament, meditation for 8 hours would lead to peace and serenity. Happiness is something else my friend.

Those weren't red herrings. What does Peterson know about leading a happy or meaningful life? He looks
old and miserable and has built an online following of college age kids for saying the most inane things. Good for him.

I'll give peat this, he does seem genuinely content and at peace. Probably all that progesterone.

 

[Hugh Johnson]

Meditation for 8 hours wouldn't lead to happiness it would lead to homelessness and social isolation. Supposing one could stand the boredom.
Most people would not be happy in such circumstances. But supposing one is a trustfund kid with a unique temperament, meditation for 8 hours would lead to peace and serenity.
/QUOTE]
Nope. Maybe where you live, but not here. And like I said you know nothing about meditation, like you know nothing about happiness or Peterson.

 

[pimpnamedraypeat]

Nope. Maybe where you live, but not here. And like I said you know nothing about meditation, like you know nothing about happiness or Peterson.

It seems like you're trying to win an argument instead of having a discussion.

How can you possibly know what I know about Peterson or happiness?

And where do you live where people go around meditation for 8 hours a day?

Where do you live where people go meditating for 8 hours a day without losing their job, home, and social network.

 

[REOSIRENS]

I could see Facebook and other social media causing this. My wife goes on there all the time and comments to me about how much fun other people are having, as if we're not. She posts pictures of our hobby farm and I'm sure some other person is like "Wow I want that life!".

Man! Feel the same

 

[Hugh Johnson]

It seems like you're trying to win an argument instead of having a discussion.

How can you possibly know what I know about Peterson or happiness?

And where do you live where people go around meditation for 8 hours a day?

Where do you live where people go meditating for 8 hours a day without losing their job, home, and social network.

I don't bother making a proper argument because I don't respect you. You make statements about meditation and society that are obviously wrong, based on your own personal hallucinations, then add some add hominems against Peterson, and expect me to to respond with a real argument? You can meditate all day in almost any rich society without getting into trouble, and you can do it in any society with buddhist monasteries. The fact that you do not know how the world works does not make you right.

 

[pimpnamedraypeat]

I don't bother making a proper argument because I don't respect you. You make statements about meditation and society that are obviously wrong, based on your own personal hallucinations, then add some add hominems against Peterson, and expect me to to respond with a real argument? You can meditate all day in almost any rich society without getting into trouble, and you can do it in any society with buddhist monasteries. The fact that you do not know how the world works does not make you right.

Riiiight. I forgot we live in lala land where people don't have kids or jobs or anything that demands the precious time and attention that could be spent gazing at their navels.

I don't like Peterson. He's an overhyped flash in the pan.

Anyone that gains the devotion of today's youth is almost certainly a charlatan.

Trump and Peterson have a large intersection of followers for that reason. They're both made for reality TV characters.

 

[Tarmander]

Riiiight. I forgot we live in lala land where people don't have kids or jobs or anything that demands the precious time and attention that could be spent gazing at their navels.

I don't like Peterson. He's an overhyped flash in the pan.

Anyone that gains the devotion of today's youth is almost certainly a charlatan.

Trump and Peterson have a large intersection of followers for that reason. They're both made for reality TV characters.

What specifically do you think makes him a charlatan? Peterson not Trump...

 

[Kyle M]

+1

 

[pimpnamedraypeat]

What specifically do you think makes him a charlatan? Peterson not Trump...

My gut.

 

[Tarmander]

My gut.

pfff

 

[CarbAppreciator]

There's a difference between the pursuit of happiness and acting happy all the time.

Pursuing things is dopaminergic. Acting happy is harm avoidance/serotonergic.

 

[Xisca]

The purpose of life is to love your neighbor as you love yourself so that you may have eternal life.

The hard part is figuring out how to love yourself.

That is why maybe a french writter wrote "Je est un autre", which means "I is somebody else"
So you can love this somebody!

BTW, some meditation are NOT boring, and can make you feel good in 10 mns.
You can also be happy when you are present; though few people know what it means and thus nobody really had success by achieving what the tempting Eckart Tolle is talking about! You cannot be here and now as long as you have some past activation; because any present situation that will trigger a past activation will remove you from the present.
Now yes I can manage to feel happy inside AND have some pain at the same time. I am present to the pain and feel it, but I am still in contact with at least a flint of joy. And just start the fire when the worse is over. Just live like cavewomen, go along with your flint and do not count with the modern lighter.

 

[pimpnamedraypeat]

That is why maybe a french writter wrote "Je est un autre", which means "I is somebody else"
So you can love this somebody!

BTW, some meditation are NOT boring, and can make you feel good in 10 mns.
You can also be happy when you are present; though few people know what it means and thus nobody really had success by achieving what the tempting Eckart Tolle is talking about! You cannot be here and now as long as you have some past activation; because any present situation that will trigger a past activation will remove you from the present.
Now yes I can manage to feel happy inside AND have some pain at the same time. I am present to the pain and feel it, but I am still in contact with at least a flint of joy. And just start the fire when the worse is over. Just live like cavewomen, go along with your flint and do not count with the modern lighter.

how does one deactivate past activation?

 

[Energizer]

I find the fake smiles and mock politeness often in large government organizations, or very large corporations. Large, successfully run businesses tend to hire genuinely happy and successful people, and although their behavior seems odd, it does not appear as forced as the reiterated lines of a state insurance representative or Microsoft tech support rep. There are countless exceptions, of course. Small businesses can be the most enjoyable, as everything seems natural and casual, or they can be some of the worst, yet most genuine interactions. I find these to be refreshing because life is hard, and when people pretend it isn't, it's a form of lying.

Germans don't smile because they have a cultural belief in the inherent suffering of life, and smiling deposes this truth and undermines the struggling of the individual. You can find this in German philosophy, as with Nietzsche's ubermensch, or superman (one who overcomes all odds).

Russians believe that personal property begins and ends at the self (the person smiling may invite an intrusion on his or her self.) Therefore, a maintained neutral expression does not invite touch and violation of the individual.

Interesting stuff. Thoreau I think was one of the earlier public figures to note how he thought a lot of people were quietly and desperately unhappy. I think this phenomenon is rooted in the rise of the Industrial Age, perhaps even earlier. I am definitely not suggesting we all go back to caves or huts necessarily but I think simplicity in the modern age is a virtue. Wanting more and more in the modern age has left many of us hanging dry and thinking is this it, is this all life is? Life doesn't have to be so hard but as a civilization we've turned into busy idiots with not a lot to show for it, except the poorer simpler folks that only work as much as they need to for food, like fishermen or farmers.

The work hard till you retire notion is part of that. It's so insane that it can almost make my head spin to think how much less stressed we'd be if we stopped trying so hard to be productive for the sake of productivity and lived a simpler life or at least a life in which we had more free time to enjoy, instead of pissing it away to make someone else money and pay our bills. Granted I know there are some who do enjoy their work passionately and do productive work but I think they are in the minority. Perhaps by being more authentic, it will force many of us to confront ourselves and remind us of the uncomfortable realities of life, and hopefully, change them or at least cope with them better and not feel as alone.

 

[JoeKool]

It's funny because owning stuff has the opposite effect, if you follow Buddhism. Buying an expensive car, for example, you don't own the car but the car owns you. Sometimes thinking we'll be happy upon ownership but the increased responsibility and problems sometimes counter it. Biggie understood it...

Equivalently, it was Trump that said the homeless person was richer than him... cuz he owes no one... whereas the rest of us with mortgages are actually net negative , and one can argue ... truly broke.

Happiness is relative ... and it has penis right there in the word, so that's gotta mean something ...

Great topic as always with studies to back it up. Nice @haidut !

 

[Xisca]

how does one deactivate past activation?

Discharge it the way it (should) happen just after a stressful event. When you think about escaping a car accident and having a big sigh of relief, this is it, explore what the body does instinctively right AFTER a stress. It goes down much much much slower than the activation went up. Humans have forgotten they have to let the body TIME to do this before going on in life! If the body cannot discharge, then it keeps it for later on, and eventually never does.

Then we end up with so much charge that we get some symptoms like anxiety or panic attack, or whatever is reliesed by a momentary new stuff we have bought... Our self inside wants to complete the discharge, and will look for any opportunity to do it. It can be why we find ourselves in similar situations day after day, it is a sign. But usually, as we do not know how it works for not having learned it, we loose the opportunity to discharge the present stress and we enlarge the charge further, to a point it becomes difficult to do it alone. Better is to try to feel what the body does after daily stress, and observe the route the body choses for an automatic genuine relaxation. At least from a stressed state to a less stressed state! Observe the change that is felt in the body, tension, muscles, skin sensation, heat, cold, hairs up, heart beat, spontaneous breating like sigh or yawn, spontaneous desire to stretch, opening of the ear to some sounds that were unperceived a few seconds before.... Then see how you can help this, not force it, but help by feeling your grounded feet, by looking at your favorite colour, looking for it around. Control what your choice is, but not the spontaneous raction of the body. It has to be spontaneous for being genuine at autonomous level, and this is the level of happyness.

When you know how to desactivate recent activation, by observing your spontaneous strategies so that you let them happen fully until feeling expantion (stress contract, happiness comes from expantion), only then you can try to deal with the past ones. They will come out when they know they have a chance to be discharged out instead of held back again. The body is wise. Most of us here are observing the body reactions after taking such and such supp or using such red light, doing such breathing exercise, and this is the good route.

Also, we appreciate the good feelings of getting better! We have to do this more often, and not only be concentrated on the goal of dealing with more of what is still unhealthy. When we take time to remember all the good things achieved, then it creates some happyness too.

 

[SaltGirl]

Alan Watts is of course a classic for anyone who needs to acquire a bit of zen and perspective.







“Man suffers only because he takes seriously what the gods made for fun.”
― Alan W. Watts

 

[pimpnamedraypeat]

alan watts is a doped out hippie clown.

@Xisca so like crying in the shower? smoking and getting drunk. maybe crying would help but a lot of what is done for relaxation is no bueno.

 

[sladerunner69]

You obviously know nothing about meditation, and then construct an argument based on your ideas, which you think are true because you thought of them. Then you say a bunch of red herrings about Peterson and complain about people quoting thinkers on a forum dedicated to the work of one thinker.

Ray Peat is a thinker but also a researcher, which are of course intimately related, just not the most accurate word I would use.

So a core principle of Peat's philosophy regarding thinking is to disregard established paradigms, dogma, authority and such. He embraces empiricism, not rationalism. A very basic premise of empiricism is to only believe what you have seen/felt/experienced for yourself. In other words, "the only true method of knowledge is through experiment".

Now I personally like Jordan Peterson, and I agree with much of his political philosophy- though that is neither here nor there because the point I want to make is that Jordan Peterson shares the same vice as many professors do when lecturing or sharing their thoughts. They practice authoritarianism. Whenever I listen to a Jordan Peterson talk the criticism I always have are his blanket claims like "the world has become very bad at math", or "individualism is very bad" or "christianity forms the basis of our society" and essentially prescribing exactly what kind of attitudes other people should have and what kind of thoughts and feelings they should invoke regarding "this or that issue". This is how authoritarians act, prescribing their will and beliefs on other people, not just doing it with physical force, but with mental force as well.

I think I agree with a lot of his positions, but to make these blanket absolutist statements is really a mistake...

 

[Hugh Johnson]

Ray Peat is a thinker but also a researcher, which are of course intimately related, just not the most accurate word I would use.

So a core principle of Peat's philosophy regarding thinking is to disregard established paradigms, dogma, authority and such. He embraces empiricism, not rationalism. A very basic premise of empiricism is to only believe what you have seen/felt/experienced for yourself. In other words, "the only true method of knowledge is through experiment".

Now I personally like Jordan Peterson, and I agree with much of his political philosophy- though that is neither here nor there because the point I want to make is that Jordan Peterson shares the same vice as many professors do when lecturing or sharing their thoughts. They practice authoritarianism. Whenever I listen to a Jordan Peterson talk the criticism I always have are his blanket claims like "the world has become very bad at math", or "individualism is very bad" or "christianity forms the basis of our society" and essentially prescribing exactly what kind of attitudes other people should have and what kind of thoughts and feelings they should invoke regarding "this or that issue". This is how authoritarians act, prescribing their will and beliefs on other people, not just doing it with physical force, but with mental force as well.

I think I agree with a lot of his positions, but to make these blanket absolutist statements is really a mistake...

He does not make definite blanket statements, has never said "individualism is very bad", and your views on him are nothing but a strawman. When he generalizes, he usually says he is doing so.