You ever wonder why we’re here? Why all of a sudden we find ourselves conscious and immersed in a fleshly body inhabiting this Earth? Personally I have my theories, but now isn’t the time to go into them (paid subscribers only - hah!). Whatever the reasons may be, they’re less important for right now. What’re more important are the things we aren’t meant to do - and these mostly center around the idea of comfort.
In modern culture we want everything immediately and as easily as possible. We want our food delivered to our door in ten minutes, we want sex easily accessible on our phones, we want smart homes and smart appliances doing everything for us. Whatever it is, it better be fast and it better be easy, or else we’re not buying it. See, that’s the keyword - buying. Our hyper-industrialized consumer culture feeds into our desire for comfort. On top of that add the technological dick-swinging contest of Silicon Valley, and we’ve created a beast that we can no longer control.
The problem is, we still live within the constructs of our known reality, and with that comes The Law of Equivalent Exchange (shout out to all my Full Metal Alchemist fans). With an increase of speed and ease comes a decrease in quality - this rings true across the board. We make food faster and more accessible than ever, but it’s literally killing us (McDonalds, obesity, seed oils, processed sugars, etc.). We make sex easier than ever, but we’ve forgotten how to love (skyrocketing divorce and infidelity rates). We make communicating faster than ever, but we’ve lost the ability to truly bond (iPhones, Instagram, TikTok, etc.) With great power comes great responsibility, and we’re absolutely blowing it. I imagine an episode of The Twilight Zone in 1959 looking exactly like the world we live in today, and that’s just frightening.
Many people believe we are heading into a Golden Age, where we will essentially merge with technology and take over the universe as an intergalactic robo-species (or something like that). We are meeting all of our elemental needs, so now we can look towards greater things. There are parts to all of this that I like (a.k.a. the looking towards greater things part), but the rest is rubbish. I can get behind the argument of technology improving the lives of severely malnourished and disease-infected populations across the globe, but the “race to comfort” is a step too far.
Have you ever built something with your own two hands? Have you ever come home from a day of manual labor soaked with grease from head to toe? Have you ever went running in the middle of the winter in your skivvies just because? I have, and all of these things bring up the same feeling inside of me - the feeling of being human. To be human is to struggle, to fight, to persevere. There’s something in my bones that remembers the pain and struggle of my ancestors, and that familiarity makes me feel at home. It makes me feel like I belong. It makes me feel honored to be alive.
Do you think the great heroes of human history would have sat on the couch all day and watched “Friends” reruns? Do you think Socrates would have eaten McDonalds? Do you think Joan of Arc would have swiped on Tinder? Do you think Nikola Tesla would have made those stupid TikTok dance videos? I think not. We’re numbing and dumbing ourselves down through the bigotry of low expectations, and we don’t even realize it. Within each of us there is an endless river of potential, yet we accept the narrative that the pinnacle of life is a 5k entertainment center in our living room. Wtf?
The answer is simple - comfort feels good. It feels good to eat shitty food. It feels good to fuck whoever we want without a care in the world. It feels good to be validated by 100k likes on TikTok. It feels good, but it ends right then and there. In the long run, it actually makes things worse. Shitty food eventually leads to health problems. Careless sex eventually leads to difficulty in long-term partnerships (more to come on this in future reflections). Digital addiction eventually leads to extreme depression, anxiety and self-worth issues. A moment of comfort isn’t worth a lifetime of pain, no matter which way you slice it.
The reality of our situation became clear to me only after I got sober. I used to try to squeeze every ounce out of every moment I could. I wanted to feel good every second of every day. So I drank and took stimulants all day long, ate dollar slices of pizza for lunch every day, and fucked anyone who was willing to fuck me. I was miserable, and I wanted to die. After I got sober, I saw that that lifestyle wasn’t going to bring me what I wanted. I started to workout and take care of my body, one day at a time. I started to eat healthy, and I started to feel really good. I started to be more conscientious about sex (this one is still a work in progress), and I started to feel respect for myself. When I finally caught my breath and looked up at the world outside, I recognized the same thing everywhere. So many people were depressed, anxious and unhappy, endlessly chasing after this faux momentary bliss.
We are human. We are meant for adventure. We are meant to be heroes in our own unique ways, the heroes of our own particular stories. Chasing after comfort is not a part of our Hero’s Journey. I challenge you to do something difficult today (I mean, really difficult…maybe a Murph!?!). Take notice of how you feel after.
There’s nothing else like it in the world.