The shortcut to a good life no one wants to hear

Alex Mathers
3 min readFeb 21, 2024

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Did you notice?

The more we do some things in life, the more we want them.

These things tend to deliver a heady dopamine hit, which makes us feel great for a while until we get an itching for me. That itch is often quick to show up after apparent satiation.

Doughnuts, sex, feel-good TV, video games, cigarettes, junk food, chocolate, and caffeine.

All are addictive, and this is why. They never deliver total satisfaction because they raise our chemicals before dumping them shortly after. The crash makes us want more.

Most of these dopamine pleasure sources come from artificial stimulants. In other words, they are not things we find out in nature, like a beautiful sunset or a splash of water after a long dry walk in the desert (except the sex part, but this was never intended for continual use like us modern degenerate hump monkeys think it does).

When we feel unsatiated and unfulfilled from things we didn’t really need in the first place, we are dragged off-track.

Because there’s always that fix to hunt down.

We don’t need tons of sex, doughnuts or TV show binges. They just make us feel good. But we feel good because we’re tricking our bodies with dopamine jolts that gradually numb us.

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Alex Mathers

Helping you develop a consistent writing habit with impact. Regular tips: https://www.masteryden.com