Distractions like Netflix and sweets don’t satisfy our deeper longing for meaning and true satisfaction. When will we break this cycle?
Aren’t we all striving to feel fulfilled? Not just a quick dose of excitement or pleasure but a real feeling of deep fulfillment.
The bursts of positive stimuli are really short lived. They leave us short-changed and make us feel empty and hollow in the long run. They are inherently dissatisfactory.
It is ironic that nowadays most products and goods are designed to give us short cycles of pleasure. They keep us hooked, coming back for more. In turn the companies make a good profit.
While it would be easy to blame the bad corporations, it really is an issue that lies within us.
We stay at the surface of our being, covering up the lows with some quick fixes. However, the quick fixes stop working at some point. We can’t hide anymore. We can’t run from the fact that we are unhappy.
No pleasure in the world can cover it up anymore.
Pleasure is Not Satisfaction
The thing is that pleasure and satisfaction are not the same thing. We mistakenly believe they are, but they are not. Pleasure is short-lived. Satisfaction, in the way I am using it, is not. It is something that can be a background feeling in your life. It’s the feeling of being at home and being at ease with yourself.
When we confuse pleasure and satisfaction, we end up going back to something that always disappoints.
We, of course, assume that we just need more of the same stimulus. Hence, we start overdoing it. But the more we try to get the satisfaction, the less it is there.
The Way Out
The one way to let go of the incessant short term pleasure seeking is to actually look at what it is doing to us.
We need to stop and become really honest. Does the endless facebook scrolling really satisfy me?
Is the endless youtube watching really stopping the craving? Or is it more like an endless hole that never gets filled?
What happens to me when I just keep giving into those superficial desires?
Only by becoming real, and acknowledging what is happening within us, can we really drop it.
We drop it, not because we should but because we see how much it does not serve us and how it actually harms us.
The Emptiness and The Discomfort
When we stop giving into the cravings that simply keep us trapped in the same place, the inherent emptiness we feel comes more to the foreground. It is our aversion towards that emptiness that kept up the habit in the first place.
How do you know that the emptiness is bad?
How do you know that the feelings that surface are bad and need to be repressed?
The assumption that they are is the lie here. We don’t actually know. Just because something doesn’t feel comfortable does not mean it is bad.
The truth is, that you have those feelings and sensations. Repressing them, has not made them go away nor does denying them. It may be time to take a different approach.
Opening up to What Is
Since you can’t resolve the feelings by denying them nor repressing them, the only real solution is to open up to them. They’re here anyways, and they have been here for a while, so we may just get to know them.
How does it really feel?
Most people don’t even know how it really feels. Most people live in the projection of what they think it feels like. Ever said ‘ouch’ in anticipation of having pain before the pain was actually there? Or maybe you just tensed up before anything happened.
That is what I am talking about. Living in that projection is not the real thing. How does it really feel?
We don’t have to dwell on the feelings, we simply can spend a few minutes honestly and openly exploring it before we move on with our day.
When we open up to what is, it stops controlling our life. It can finally unravel and pass through you. By tightening, suppressing, and denying, it becomes like a pipe that we block.
Finding Real Satisfaction
Real satisfaction is in many ways found in how we are being and is not so much found in what we do. What we do simply becomes an extension of how we are being.
Are we simply staying at the surface of our being or are we really diving deeply into ourselves, embracing all of us?
The key to becoming truly satisfied is to listen to yourself more deeply. No one can tell you what is right for you; only you can find it.
By listening to the deeper spaces of yourself, will you find what is right for you. It may cut through your life as it is right now if that life has been built on lies and fears. However, it will lead you to a life that is right and true for you.
Once we feel the deeper satisfaction, the short lived pleasures are like a joke. Why would we ever choose that over a deeper sense of fulfilment?