The Illusions of Pleasure

An exploration into desire and anticipation of suffering in the pursuit of a fulfilling life

Each month, we tackle a different theme on how to live what the ancient philosophers called the “good life”—a life in the pursuit of becoming the best version of oneself.

For the month of March, we’ve been focusing on the theme of suffering and its role in everyday existence. You can find links to the series at the bottom of this article.

This Week at a Glance:

This week we explore the growing trend in modern society of the pursuits of empty pleasures and our ignorance of inevitable pain.

By the time you finish this meditation, you’ll learn:

🍭 Why humans pursue pleasure and avoid pain from an evolutionary perspective;
🍬 How modern living is set up to hijack your willpower and take control of your nature’s desire for pleasure;
🍫 Ways in which we can avoid pleasure while also preparing for any suffering that may come our way in the future.

Built within each of us is a desire to pursue pleasure and avoid pain. This is, as the Yale psychologist Paul Bloom summarized, one of the most simplistic views of human nature.¹

Evolutionarily speaking, however, pleasure was our original way of determining how to survive—what foods to eat, how to reproduce, what to seek and what to avoid.

But in our current day living, all of the basic survival needs are met. And companies understand this. By understanding our basic hardwiring (find what people find pleasurable), companies are able to exploit our nature and build products that ride off of our biological desires for survival. These items are then byproducts of our natural desires for pleasure.²

Pleasure today therefore is a treadmill we all gleeful jump on. It is around every corner and built into the majority of the lives we live today.

• The technology we consume is created with dopamine hits built in.

• Youtube feeds you videos you like and has auto-play features so you continue watching content on the platform.

• Even the food we consume is purposely modified with sugar, salt, and fat as a way to hijack our taste buds and keep us reaching for more.

Don’t get me wrong, some of these things are a convenience, we enjoy the benefits of great tasting food or that hilarious cat video when we need a pick me up.

But if we do not have self-control, if we do not have systems set up to prevent ourselves from being sucked in by these tactics, we will quickly get thrown onto the hedonic treadmill—a never ending pursuit of more dopamine hits trying to capture the last great “high” we had.

The hedonic treadmill is like a smoking a cigarette—the first cigarette of the day always holds the most nicotine punch and is the strongest hit you will get. Every cigarette after that is just chasing that first high, never able to truly recapture it no matter how many cigarettes one has.

And we fall prey to these desires for pleasure because they build a facade that they can and will keep us away from pain and suffering. They tell us they will assist in avoiding difficult situations and questions about our lives we’d rather not think about.

In the blockbuster hit movie Barbie, there is a cadence that puts this directly in play. An average day in Barbieland is “perfection”—great neighbors, lots of smiles, a party and drinks.

And this “perfection” continues day-in and day-out, the same routine, the same smiles, parties, and drinks.

Then, at one of the nightly dance parties, Barbie asks the group:

“Do you guys ever think about dying?”

The record scratches to a halt and all eyes dart to Barbie—she’s clearly speaking of something no one else wishes to speak or even think of—so she plays it off and the good times continue to roll…

For everyone except Barbie… who is thinking about the human condition.

Paul Bloom reminds us that these questions are within each of us but we attempt to keep them at bay simply by doing what we can to prevent boredom:

“One reason why doing nothing is so unpleasant is that our thoughts, unfettered by distraction, takes us to uncomfortable places.”³

These heavy-handed questions may not be ideal for talking about in the midst of a dance party, but they are nonetheless vital to every day life (it is called the human condition for a reason after all).

Questions and emotions dealing with issues such as these are vital because they reside within our actions, underlying our thoughts, both consciously and unconsciously, and force us to confront other serious questions of our existence:

• What am I here for?

• What is my purpose?

• Do I have meaning in life?

By living in a Barbie-like fantasy where we refuse to review these fundamental questions of life, we fail to prepare for the hardships that life will inevitably push on us. We therefore weaken our ability to properly handle them when they arise.

The Stoic philosopher Seneca advised his brother 2,000 years ago that rather than wait for the adversities of life to arrive, we need to prepare for them ahead of their arrival:

“Everything might happen; anticipate everything. Even in good there is something rather unsavory. Human nature contains treacherous thoughts, ungrateful ones, greedy and wicked ones… When everything seems serene, the dangers are still present, only sleeping. Always suppose that something offensive to you is going to arise.”⁴

He would go on to also write to his friend Lucilius on the matter and tell him:

“Whatever can happen at any moment can happen today.”⁵

Life is a constant game of preparation for the next thing in life but we often are too focused on being pulled into the daily grind and seeking pleasure to avoid the tough realities of life.

Pain is an innate aspect of life that cannot be avoided. And while it cannot be avoided, we can hedge against its arrival and ultimate crushing existence by preparing for it ahead of time. By mentally anticipating a scenario’s occurrence, but trying to live through it, mentally or in actuality, one is better acclimated to it and can better overcome it when it strikes.

Seneca recommend to Lucilius to set aside time every month to live the life we fear. Are we afraid of losing our home and having to sleep on the ground? Practice sleeping on the ground and see if it is as bad as anticipated.⁶

What he is advising it to rehearse the adversities before they arrive so one can be in better position to bear and overcome them.

Life is ruled by too many variables and flukes to believe we know how everything in our lives will turn out. We will be surprised. And those surprises sometimes hurt, they knock us off our feet and leave us with a bruised right eye from an invisible left hook.

The best thing to do to avoid these moments is take a step back and understand while we tend to chase pleasure, pain is waiting around every corner and will inevitably find us. But we can loosen its grip on us once it arrives by being prepared for it, by thinking ahead to what can happen and if it does how we will react to it.

A good question to always have on hand is: what do I currently have in my arsenal to lessen the problem when it arrives?

A follow up?: what do I NOT currently have in my arsenal that would benefit me to have in order to lessen the problem when it arrives?

We will never be able to see the future and prevent all pain, but we can try our best to be prepared for it. And for those who think pleasure can be the blanket we run and hide under, Seneca reminds us that even with a hedonistic lifestyle and the pursuits of pleasure alone, they are but a fleeting existence:

"Pleasure dies at the very moment when it charms us most. It has no great scope, and therefore it soon cloys and wearies us, and fades away as soon as its first impulse is over."⁷

3-Bullet Summary:

• It is natural for us to pursue pleasure as this was what helped us survive for hundreds of thousands of years but modern-day society is hijacking our inclination to pleasure;

• By seeing the empty pleasures in life for what they are and understanding suffering is inevitable, we can live a happier life;

• When we attempt to anticipate future pains and sufferings, we’re better equipped to handle the matters once they arrive.

Thank you for reading this week’s meditation. It’s through sharing that Mind Candy spreads.

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For the month of March, we’ve been focusing on the theme of suffering through our Monday Meditations (MM), Wednesday Wisdoms (WW), and Friday Sweet Bites (SB).

Here are the topics covered so far if you wish to catch up:

• Suffering and Flourishment (MM | WW | SB)

If this or any of my other work has resonated, please consider upgrading to a paid membership (it’s less than a cup of coffee per week, and sweeter).

Until next week,

D.A. DiGerolamo

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1. Paul Bloom, The Sweet Spot

2. Paul Bloom, How Pleasure Works

3. Paul Bloom, The Sweet Spot

4. Seneca, How to Keep Your Cool

5. Seneca, Letters from a Stoic

6. ibid.

7. Seneca, On the Happy Life