I experience frequent, urgent cravings and act on them immediately. When I open my eyes, I know exactly what I want: to wear a particular little outfit, buy a sandwich of a certain heft and filling from this shop in this area, and eat it on a bench under a tree. It is a shame that the place in me capable of conjuring these whims also frequently produces other, much more boring, and occasionally dangerous urges too. My brain is constantly playing Hungry Hungry Hippos, urging me to do things that bring me little pleasure. Why do I want things that don't make me happy? The mechanisms of society designed to exploit my lizard brain are at my mercy.
The idea of a primitive brain nestled in the clay of our most recent evolved, superior brains was proposed in the 1960s. It's scientific credulity is just as important to me as the astrology app that sends me notifications each morning is to me, because it provides a structure for me to think about my habits and how to change them. The most primitive part of the brain is the reptilian brain. I think it's like a baby that needs constant attention from the other parts of the brain, like a baby from the movie Eraserhead.
The less regulated this part of the brain is, the more regrettable the desires are. As we grow out of childhood, we are able to regulate these desires, although it is more difficult for some people. Without us really noticing, desires can run away with themselves. The caterpillar that wants an apple on Monday is the same caterpillar that wants fruit on Tuesday, plums on Wednesday, strawberries on Thursday, five oranges on Friday and a piece of chocolate cake.
Giving in to our reptilian desires has been encouraged, rebranded as a sort of self-care by a society that wants us to consume and those of us who enjoy consuming with impunity. We are often experiencing anxiety dressed up as hedonism. This is obvious if you have experience with any kind of addiction. If dyeing your hair orange and eating too many Haribo is what you want to do, but instead of buying cocaine, you should just go for it. The truth is that cravings and their related behaviours don't have to involve life-destructive habits to rob us of joy. I don't lose days of my life to bingeing booze and drugs, but the same lack of impulse control robs me of my time. I pick up my phone and open new apps when I close them, like most people do. How did my phone get into my hand? My lizard brain tells me that reality TV will feel good, but what it often feels like is closer to nothing. It tells me to do things that require little energy and to give little in the way of reward.
Dopamine is not a cognitive drug. It doesn't know what we enjoy or what we don't. submission as an act of self-care is extremely misguided. The lizard brain doesn't care what we do, it just knows what it likes. It has very little purpose and succeeds only to make a noise that distracts us from what we intended to do.
How can I get what I want? How can I quiet the baby, which nobody is sure is actually a baby at all, but is just a bunch of unhappinesses, swaddled and happy, and reach for the things that make you happy? If only I knew. We are taught not to want too much. We are rewarded for consuming, but not for taking as much as we should. It's difficult to not assign moral value to our urges when we see a world that encourages and shames us for the same behaviors. I focus on the times when I have felt calm and fulfilled, not the sweet little drips, drips, drips of dopamine, but the deep, quiet satisfaction at the end of a difficult task or a long journey. It is not about one or the other. Thankfully for me. I will try to live a balanced life, but I will always serve my lizard-brain king.
Eli Goldstone is the author of Strange Heart Beating.
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