freedom
Addictions
Thursday, June 24th, 2010 | analysis, sex | No Comments
Too much of a good thing is always bad, they say. Also, too much of a good thing can lead to addiction, no matter what that good thing is, or how innocent it seems – chemical liaisons just form in one’s brain, pleasure inducing hormones such as dopamine and serotonin get repeatedly released, in high quantities, whenever you get that “good thing” around (dopamine) or have a good taste of it (serotonin), and there we are. It works for chocolate, for mountain rides, shopping, blackjack and it also, or especially, works for sex, love and their magnificent combination.
Now, as human beings we value freedom. We value it so much that we fail to truly understand it many times, and, generally, we realize it’s gone only in the most trivial, obvious cases. Truth is, we lose it each time we refuse to fully understand a situation, each time we trade realism for idealism because idealism sounds so much better, only to end up with a deformed perception on reality – like a clear image on it would be easily achievable, anyway…
We love chocolate for the delicious reward that it is, shopping for the illusions of beauty and infinite seduction it brings for our narcissistic selves, idealism for its righteous passion, and we love love. Many of our addictions are originally natural and nonetheless useful things. Even blackjack – I know someone who made a living for his family out of it, during the hard period following World War II. But when we can’t resist emptying our debit & credit cards at the mall, we lose ourselves. Even more when we can’t see the reality and refuse to understand the whole depth of people in their purely human greatness and even more human misery or mediocrity – an addiction to idealism leads fast enough to a taste for misconceptions and prejudice. And even more when love ceases to be generous and becomes dependence and obsession (great article here, by the way, although it only covers erotical love).
Someone told me recently that everyone is an addict, and if they should be addicted to something, they would chose love and ideals. My firm belief is that nicotine would be better.
Us, the world and its problems
Monday, March 9th, 2009 | analysis, life, people | No Comments
Ever wondered what’s wrong with the world? Lately?
“Oh, not the voices again!” I hear you crying. “Not another financial-crisis article, pleeease. Cool down, relax, and just give us a speech of sex, luxury and refinement, ’cause that’s the way we want it.”
Trouble is this crisis seems to be ruining our lives more than just economically. First, it is excessively mediatised, over discussed, and so goddamn annoying. Secondly, it is basically everywhere and it’s affecting us all. Its main evilness: does not only produce inflation, debt and unemployment, but it also produces a large amount of stress and anxiety. We can live with inflation: we’ll simply cut some of our expenses and limit spending our cash on basic items. We can live with debt. We can live with unemployment, too: there are various ways to earn money and with some smarts and some little bit of creativity one can always make a living. However, living with the stress and anxiety produced by this conjecture is the worse part of it.
Worrying kills, they say. Truth is worrying kills everything. The uncertainty of tomorrow is making us less open to life. We just don’t seem to enjoy things the way we used to, and we don’t get the same courage and energy out of our leisures and hobbies. We don’t love less but we less express it and, also, less savor it. Because we are not free to, we are too busy worrying and worry has already taken us for good. Our relationships grow colder because of it, when it is in times of trouble we should lay more on others and others on us. Our mind starts producing risk-free solutions and scenarios, working for safety and stability, when one should think and fight for his own, sacred, personal development. When risk-free actually means freedom-free, slave to the stronger ones, their mechanisms and their laws.
Lets keep ourselves out of this, dear friends, for the love and sake of all beautiful things out there, for the true marvels the world and the human spirit so genuinely contain. Let us hope for better us. Let us love and let us not forget our friends, our sweethearts, our spirit and our happiness. Let us not work for a safer future, but for one that is richer in good will and humanity. Let us allow ourselves to forget stocks and to never forget or underestimate intimacy, in its deepest, most fulfilling sense. Let us be free and human despite everything, ’cause if there is a reason we were born for, it is love.