updated 2mo ago
Welp. This definitely explains why I quit cannabis cold turkey out of the blue last month. Just woke up and was like “I’m good.” It was my favorite way to escape until I stopped wanting to escape and I wanted to build a world around myself that I don’t need to escape from.
All across our culture, you’ll find people eager to abandon the fundamental task of our lives, fostering and maintaining human connection, so that they can fall deeper into a pit of hedonistic distraction forever. You send an email a large language model wrote for you to spare yourself a minute of mental activity at the end of a long day working f
... See morefrom You Are You. We Live Here. This is Now. by Freddie deBoer
sari and added
- the first time you do something that everyone in your social environment tells you is a bad idea, and it turns out you were right, is more psychoactive than any drug
muizz and added
Luc Cheung and added
The artist and the addict both wrestle with this experience of exile. They share an acute, even excruciating sensitivity to the state of separation and isolation, and both actively seek a way to overcome it, to transcend it, or at least to make the pain go away.
from Turning Pro by Steven Pressfield
- I struggle with the cultural push toward insularity and self-reliance. I suffer from the inertia of screens and the ennui of stuff. I indulge in the brief hit of dopamine comfort that comes from online shopping (the kitchen gadgets, the houseplants, the skincare products). I drink wine to unwind. I sip from the warm cup of promised safety and comfo... See more
from Notes & Highlights for How We Show Up by Mia Birdsong
Brandy Cerne added
Enter: a drink, a lover, a habit. Addiction replaces aspiration. The quick fix wins out over the long, slow haul.
from Turning Pro by Steven Pressfield
At first, these adaptations make it possible to survive. But eventually, the methods you used to feel comfortable and safe rendered you increasingly defended, shut down, prone to escapism, resistant to reality, anxious, avoidant, neurotic, narcissistic, depressed, hopeless. This is true because when you function through a series of defenses, fantas
... See morefrom Are You a Settler? by Ask Polly
Bronwyn added
- all the things I had assumed would make me happy in sobriety never panned out the way I thought they would. Many of the dreams I'd had before I got sober simply do not matter anymore. There are no more dreams big enough to replace this wild new reality. My life is much smaller than it used to be, but it's also the biggest it's ever been.
from The Unsolved Mysteries of Anthony Bourdain's Big Life
Frank Brown added