The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:
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Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.
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Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.
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Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.
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Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).
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Notes -
What's your take on dopamine detox?
Everyone's got a story about how they read so much back in the 90's/00's. But they pick up a book now, and... it's just not entertaining. We all know we can dopamine detox and make reading enjoyable again, but the corollary is quitting the hyper-stimulating activities everyone does nowadays. No TikTok, no Twitter, no mindlessly playing games while listening to podcasts. You'll be (roughly) just as stimulated after detoxing, but you'll be disconnected from the root of modern culture. Your opinions on culture will be less accurate because you're simply out of touch, like boomers reading newspapers.
OTOH, dopamine detox has huge benefits. Your mind isn't constantly bombarded with stimulation, so you can perceive subtleties and "flavor" in art more, like when you remove sugar from coffee. You perceive the world in a slower, calmer, more rational, interconnected way. You're around people less, so when you meet people IRL you're much friendlier and happy to see them. There is probably some balance to the dopamine situation, but it's hard to spot, so we mostly stimulate ourselves as hard as possible from FOMO, scared of falling behind the world.
With regards to the first part of your post, about dopamine - I don't have knowledge about that. I barely even have a pop-sci understanding of brain chemistry. So I make no claims about that.
But this does remind me of a subject I talk about with my friends a lot.
I am an extremely avid reader. I have never personally known anyone that reads as much as I do. I have always been this way; it's what I won in the "lottery of fascinations." Accordingly: I've never had the feeling of "I should be reading more" instead of gaming, scrolling, etc. I do those things some as well, but I read without having to make myself do it. And I don't find scrolling hyper-enjoyable compared to reading at all. I read a lot more than I scroll. I'm not making myself do that by an act of will, it's my real preference.
People have often said to me: "I should read more. I always want to read more than I do." And I get the sense when they say this to me, that they are imputing some sort of virtue to the act of reading, instead of doing other things. I think this is connected with the idea that people should be productive, that they should continually be improving themselves or producing something; and that commonly, reading books is thought of as a way of doing this.
I don't think that's untrue. I do think that it is better to improve one's self than to not do that; I think it's very easy to start doing "mindless" things and piss your life away in that way. Having said that, it's not as though reading is the only way to do that. One of my friends is a painter, and she paints often, and is continually trying to get better at it. She tries to read, and feels like she's forcing to, and I don't think that she has to do that. She could just as well not. The point is: if I tried to take up painting, I'd probably feel like I was always making myself do that, too. If you are of the mindset that people should do those improving things, painting is probably just as good as reading.
But if reading was enjoyable, and now it isn't, you can do other things as well. Personally I think it's bad to be a phone zombie, but there are probably things you can find stimulating, that can keep you away from your systems without it feeling like a huge effort. Furthermore: you may reach a point in life where you've mostly got it made (see @Walterodim below), and when you're not working, you might as well chill as you like. Only you can decide if there's anything wrong with that.
As a final thought: maybe I just haven't gotten dopamine-toxed enough to need detox, and so I can't relate to the thrust of what you are saying; but other people may be able to better.
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