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It's also effortless because your goals and desires are sustainable and bring you prosperity. My desires are to chill, play music for myself and friends, sleep

It's also effortless because your goals and desires are sustainable and bring you prosperity. My desires are to chill, play music for myself and friends, sleep a lot, have sex, hike, go to concerts and generally go out and drink. Only doing that would, predictably, make me homeless eventually. Effortful actions it is for me, I guess.

lucianbr 2y ago
You should start a band. I'm pretty sure some singers' lives are exactly what you described.
gnramires 2y ago
Related to what GP said, I think desires are complicated. What you (and commonly you hear) referred to as desire might be something like a "first order desire" -- either what you would desire if there were no constraints or consequences from your actions, or what you desire immediately (and not taking your long term life into account)[1]. I think it's a good idea to visualize the consequences of your desires, because actions have consequences and the world is inherently full of constraints. So you might "desire" (1st order desire) drinking, but not desire hangover or even becoming an alcoholic, or miss some opportunity because of over sleeping (or even increased health as well), so maybe update your desire to 2nd-order desire where the consequences and constraints[2] are taken into account, and if you still desire it (e.g. find sleeping a lot really worth it), then it seems fine. I believe it's Carl Jung that talked extensively about bringing your unconscious into consciousness. Or Feynman: The first principle is you must not fool yourself, and you're the easiest person to fool :) (Although I think it's normal to have some amount of internal conflict or inconsistency that we can only resolve as we go along, experiment, work and live) [1] Maybe we should call those cravings? [2] I think a more refined approach would add philosophical implications (e.g. ethics, meaning, etc..) as well

lucianbr 2y ago

You should start a band. I'm pretty sure some singers' lives are exactly what you described.

gnramires 2y ago

Related to what GP said, I think desires are complicated. What you (and commonly you hear) referred to as desire might be something like a "first order desire" -- either what you would desire if there were no constraints or consequences from your actions, or what you desire immediately (and not taking your long term life into account)[1]. I think it's a good idea to visualize the consequences of your desires, because actions have consequences and the world is inherently full of constraints. So you might "desire" (1st order desire) drinking, but not desire hangover or even becoming an alcoholic, or miss some opportunity because of over sleeping (or even increased health as well), so maybe update your desire to 2nd-order desire where the consequences and constraints[2] are taken into account, and if you still desire it (e.g. find sleeping a lot really worth it), then it seems fine. I believe it's Carl Jung that talked extensively about bringing your unconscious into consciousness. Or Feynman: The first principle is you must not fool yourself, and you're the easiest person to fool :) (Although I think it's normal to have some amount of internal conflict or inconsistency that we can only resolve as we go along, experiment, work and live) [1] Maybe we should call those cravings? [2] I think a more refined approach would add philosophical implications (e.g. ethics, meaning, etc..) as well