Sublime

At what point can we know that ecstasy, or singular purpose, or religious fervor has become pathological, if we don’t wish to wait until obvious and irreversible damage has been done?

“cognitive entrenchment.”

Especially in situations in which unbearable emotions are stirred up, the self’s only choice is to wall itself off from whatever is threatening it, to remove itself from what it cannot regulate.

The i of DOPAMINE stands for insight

perception (which includes memory), and consciousness.

Freud wrote about our stripping unpleasant emotion from memory.

Epicurus addressed the unending and unsatisfying search for novel activities by urging that we store and recall deeply etched memories of pleasant experiences.

Consistent with the lived experience of people in recovery, truth-telling may change the brain, allowing us to be more aware of our pleasure-pain balance and the mental processes driving compulsive overconsumption, and thereby change our behavior.