THE NEW SMOKER
a strong one that drives us to this day. You only have to look at the rising obesity rates world wide in developed nations with sugar/salt packed processed foods. It’s extremely easy to overdo the things that give us pleasure. A pint of ice cream instead of a handful of grapes wins almost every time. It can take consistent will power, or maybe even mental rewiring, for some to overcome the urges to over-indulge. But eating cookies and having cocktails every so often makes one feel good; takes away the stress, if momentarily. Even the occasional binge eating or drinking can have it’s temporary emotional benefits, loosen some emotional knots, even if you may feel like crap the next day.
“We all want to play, have fun and do crazy stuff. But we also ... want have some order and control over our lives.” In certain measured doses one can enjoy a number of highs, sometimes simultaneously, without ever getting oneself into danger. It’s only when the need to get high takes over one’s world and one indulges in unhealthy amounts, that’s when it becomes a problem. It can keep one from being able to live a healthy productive life in society and negatively effects 10
Images sourced from 123RF
Stoned Cold Sober those around them. hen you have too much open excess, eventually there will be strong reactions against it. A push back from those who believe that pleasure and indulgence are bad for individuals and/or society as a whole. From Epicurean Hedonism on one side... to those on the other side with Puritanical Spartanistic beliefs. The kinds of beliefs that all pleasures are bad or sinful and are to be avoided, especially those of the body; or that it’s hardship that develops true character, instead of a variety of experience; or that one must actively suppress one’s base natures to overcome the sensual temptations that will lead to one’s eventual destruction; that the rational mind must conquer the emotional body, etc. These opposing philosophies and religions -Hedonism vs. Spartanism, Decadence vs. Puritanismin a sense represent outward manifestations of the internal struggles in all of us. We all want to play, have fun, do crazy boundary-pushing stuff. But we also tend to want have some order and control over our lives. And just like we have some extreme partiers who won’t give it up and rave on till the end
W