Feeling easy
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What
do human beings do, if they have nothing to do? What are you doing, if
you are free of all duties, and if there is no urgent need waiting to
be satisfied? Some of you may light a cigarette, lean back, and take a
deep breath. Probably you are not aware that by that, in the boring
absence of other needs, you artificially create an illusory need, that
nicotine will always be ready to satisfy (for the price of a
considerable health risk). Can't we stand the absence of needs? Why do
we feel bored so easily? Do we suffer from addiction to excitement and
distraction?
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A
python, after a copious meal, may lie down for many days, doing
nothing, just digesting, just feeling fine (although we will probably
never know for sure if a python ever feels fine). The same may be said
from a lizard dazing for hours in the sun, or from a cow ruminating in
tranquility. Sometimes, the computer organizing our behavior runs out
of commands and leaves us in an indifferent state, characterized by the
absence of pain, the absence of hunger, even the absence of lust. But
what is present, then? Is there anything? Or are we just preparing to
sleep?
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Well,
sleeping is fine. Why not? We all need our sleep. But if we are in an
idling state, without being tired? Are we able to just sit there doing
nothing? In 1963, Heinrich Böll wrote the "Anekdote zur Senkung der
Arbeitsmoral". His fisherman is able to just sit there doing nothing,
but his German tourist evidently not. We may sympathize with one or the
other. The author had much sympathy for his fisherman, but - just
follow the link
and read the story - even he is lighting a cigarette (and Böll was a
heavy smoker, too). Apparently, doing nothing is more difficult than
most of us are aware of. Either we escape from it by falling
unconscious, or we betray our brain by kindling it with artificial
excitement.
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I
was a smoker, too. I stopped 4 months ago. From time to time on
weekends, I sit at my kitchen table and I suffer. It's so hard to have
nothing to do. I just went through my newspaper, had even a glance on
the chess riddle. Nothing. Peace. Silence. It's so awful... How can I
stand it? In the same situation, just 4 months ago, I grabbed my
package of tobacco. What kind of feeling was it? Did I feel fine? Did I
feel better, then? Well, at least it was something. Studies with rats
indicate that the only reward value of nicotine consisted in the relief
of the withdrawal symptoms elicited by the cessation of chronic
nicotine use (Epping-Jordan et al. 1998). In other words: you won't
miss anything if you don't smoke, you just gain what smokers
desperately try to regain, again and again.
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Anyhow,
I didn't mean to write an essay on smoking. I wanted to write on
idling, on our inclination to make our life as easy as possible.
Somewhere in the background, we always imagine some kind of authority
arguing against it. Are we just trained to avoid it? How many of us are
willing to work, even in the absence of control? We are far away from
living in a free society. The overwhelming majority is trained to
execute commands without their complete understanding, even against
their will. This is freedom? This is our appraised "western"
civilization?
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I'm
completely sure: Our whole economy would immediately break down without
control, without forcing people to do what they have been told to do.
Most people are not doing what they want to, they are doing what they
have been told to. And in most cases they don't have the slightest idea
why they are doing what they do. They just know: they are getting paid
for. When the cat's away, the mice will play. And if I visit my
computer at work on a weekend, I will play pinball and solitair for
hours. What a strange habit. Is it this, what I want? From the bottom
of my heart? Fortunately, at least I stopped smoking.
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M.P.Epping-Jordan,
S.S.Watkins, G.F.Koob, A.Markou (1998) Dramatic decreases in brain
reward function during nicotine withdrawal. Nature 393: 76-79.
N.E. Grunberg (2007) A neurobiological basis for nicotine withdrawal. Proc. Natl. Ass. Sci. USA 104: 17901-2.
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7/05 < MB 7/05 > 7/05
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