Self Restraint
Such power there is in clear-eyed self restraint.
James Russell Lowell
Self restraint is difficult. We are curious creatures at heart, always looking to do and change things around us to better fit our needs. Curiosity and experimentation are traits that have helped us many times as a species and our brains reward us for doing things like that with dopamine.
But we've found ways to overdo dopamine. A lot of things that are “bad” for us, or just not productive, still stimulate dopamine production. So we get rewarded for doing nothing. Binge watching a show feels good, but doesn't actually accomplish anything.
Not that we need to be busily producing things all day every day. My point is that self restraint is the ability to choose things that create “slow” dopamine over things that create “fast” dopamine. Writing this post is not as fun as playing a game on my computer. But I believe that over time the rewards for creation are greater than the rewards for recreation.
So that's my goal: to pry myself away from things that are fun now and try to do things that will offer greater rewards later.
Sometimes I even succeed at following this advice!
I’m publishing this as part of 100 Days To Offload. You can join in yourself by visiting 100 Days To Offload.
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