Concept: What your brain does for you
It is always interesting when you meet someone who is unwilling to learn. They are like someone who refuses to acknowledge that their car has a trunk. One day, they decide to listen to what all their friends and family have been telling them. “Wow, this would be a great place to put groceries. Holy moley, there is an extra tire in here, how convenient!” Constant, never-ending education is the surest strategy to succeed in life.
At the end of the day, your brain is a machine whose purpose is to keep you alive and to benefit the progression of the species; not necessarily to keep you happy. Bummer, right? This makes perfect sense if you think about how evolution works. This also sucks, because you really want to be happy, but your brain can work against you on this one. Your brain is constantly tricking you into being motivated. We are usually mostly interested in the short term, and in the short term, planting crops does very little for us. In fact, it’s a fairly tiring process.
Your brain gets you to think about the future by messing with your dopamine levels. (That’s right. If you’re the least bit successful, you’re on drugs. Don’t tell your mother.) When you do something that makes your brain think that it will last longer… lets say, eat an apple…it will give you an immediate benefit by upping your dopamine level (umm, drugs). Eating an apple really does nothing for you while you’re eating it. In fact, it uses up energy to start the process of digestion. You won’t see much physical benefit for about 20 minutes. Your brain, however, is clever enough to trick you. When it senses that your tongue is tasting something sweet, it interprets that as a positive thing, and you get an immediate sensation of pleasure. Your brain is also smart enough to know that it shouldn’t give you the same amount of pleasure on your next apple. This is why your fourth serving of chocolate cake is never as good as your first. Of course, you can always trick your brain into thinking that it needs something like cigarettes or expensive shoes.
I bet you’re happy just looking at it.
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