Finding Happiness in a World of Unlimited Wants

Last week’s Poop Scoop made an argument for pursuing your wants. It claimed that in the pursuit of happiness, your wants are just as important as your needs. I stand by my argument. HOWEVER…

The human condition leaves us with potentially unlimited wants. This is problematic. With unlimited wants comes the reality that our universe has limited resources. Many of our wants cannot be filled. It is the classic problem of economics.

But I’m not here to discuss economics. I’m here to discuss happiness, and the danger that unlimited wants poses to its pursuit. If we can’t fulfill our wants, we may never be happy!

For example, the following is an incomplete list stuff I would like to get out of life:

• Share a bottle of 50 year Macallan Scotch with family and close friends
• Go back in time and follow Iron Maiden’s Beast on the Road Tour; get hammered with Steve Harris backstage.
• Arrange a three-way, pay-per-view cage match between Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Clarence Thomas, and the reanimated corpse of Antonin Scalia. Share a beer with Ginsburg after she wins.
• Marry Taylor Swift.
• Successfully hunt a bull elk, caribou, and moose. Bonus: have a beer with the boys after the hunt.
• Total 1700 pounds raw in the Squat, Bench, and Deadlift.
• Make a pilgrimage to the holy land (Scotland) and give homage to the distilleries. This will include a side-trip to Bushmills in Northern Ireland.
• Go to the top of the mountain from Rocky IV and scream “DRAGO!!!!” Record and post it to Instagram.

It should be obvious that some of these are unattainable. Others require participants that may be unwilling to go along. Even the reasonable ones, like marrying Taylor Swift, would still be challenging.

In a world of unlimited wants, what are we to do about the pursuit of happiness? Even if all our wishes come true, newer, bolder desires will be just around the corner.

I am not the first person to think about this problem. It is a theme in Homer’s Iliad. Socrates discusses this, among other things, in his dialogue with Gorgias. Even the eastern traditions discuss it in The Bhagavad Gita and The Dhammapada, albeit with less logical rigor.

Upon both reading these discussions (or using your intuition), we know that limited resources will always be an issue. We also know that humans will never cease in desiring people, places, or things. The only readily available solution is to place reasonable limits on our wants, and take great pleasure in the ones we can obtain. This is how we prevent us from losing ourselves in the pursuit of happiness.

For example, I know that liquidating in my Roth IRA for a 50 year Macallan is completely out of the question. However, I can still take great pleasure in enjoying the lesser whiskies with family and friends. I may also never get the chance to hunt moose, elk, or caribou, but I can still take great pleasure in hunting deer and elephants. Taylor Swift may divorce me in the end, but it would be a great 6 months, and there are more fish in the sea.

In the end, we cannot obtain everything we want. But we can choose a limited number of worthwhile wants and lose ourselves in their pursuit. In the end, we may end up content with life.

Thanks for reading. Now get off the toilet.

Needs, Wants, and the Squandered Genius of Karl Marx

I don’t like admitting it, but Karl Marx was on to something. In his Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844, he argued that modern industrial society had estranged workers from both their own work and from other workers. It is surprising that Marx was able to argue this so well in 1844, for the industrial revolution as we know it had only just begun.

This piece of genius aside, Marx screwed the pooch with everything else. One of his solutions to the problems facing the proletarian worker was this:

“From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”

He popularized this slogan in his 1875 Critique of the Gotha Program. We can go all day debating it, but my critique is that practical applications of this principle do not correctly interpret the term needs.

Under the various Socialist systems of the last hundred years, people’s needs have been viewed as the necessities for survival:  food, water, shelter, some level of education, and a minimal level of healthcare. People’s wants, like a nice house, a big steak, or a hunting trip, are typically viewed as unnecessary extravagances. The resources needed to attain these wants are better-spent tending to the needs of others.

Unfortunately, these needs are only sufficient to keep one’s blood pumping. They are insufficient if the people in society are to find happiness.

Happiness is a complicated thing. Smarter people than I have tried and failed to define it. Without descending into relativism, let’s just say that a happy life looks different to different people.

I may find happiness in teaching people to squat, while another man finds happiness selling cars or trading stocks. Upon acknowledging this fact, one realizes that different people need different things in their respective pursuits of happiness.

If one’s goal in life is to survive, needs are obviously more important than wants. But if one’s goal in life is to be happy, wants are equally important as one’s needs.

You can survive on bread and water. Some people are surprisingly happy on such a diet. Others crave 24-ounce steaks and good whisky. While it is academically easy to critique the latter for its excess, doing so forces arbitrary standards of happiness that, upon practical application, leave everybody miserable. In the pursuit of happiness, wants are redefined into needs, and that’s not a bad thing!

Do you want to survive, or do you want to be happy? If your answer is the latter, it’s perfectly acceptable to chase your wants, provided that doing so doesn’t compromise the life, liberty, and property of others. So go ahead, eat that steak, buy that new computer, take that vacation! Don’t feel guilty for your pursuit of happiness. Instead, just embrace it.

Thanks for reading. Now get off the toilet.

Obama, Trump, and the Pursuit of Happiness

This post is about happiness, but it uses politics as a means to examine it. If you are a mature and open-minded person, my opinions shouldn’t anger you. But if you choose to get angry with my writing, please take the extra minute to read what I am actually saying. Don’t misquote my argument and call me a fascist, a racist, or God forbid, a Socialist…

When I was in high school, I knew a fair number of Republicans that were unhappy with the Obama presidency. In fact, unhappy is the wrong word. These folks were full-on depressed, anxious, and angry. Their actual well-being was compromised because their preferred candidate lost, and a person they disliked held political office. They also lived in constant fear that their civil liberties were under attack, thinking that an evil-spirited dictator held office.

Unfortunately, I saw the same thing happen after Trump was elected. I know more than one Democrat who actually cried on election night. The fact that Trump is in office continues to make them depressed, anxious, and angry. They now live in fear that their civil liberties are under attack, thinking that an evil-spirited dictator holds office.

Holy. Fucking. Shit. You must be a special kind of stupid to place your happiness and wellbeing in the hands of a politician. I can understand why you didn’t like Obama or his policies. I can understand why you don’t like Trump or his policies. It is also completely reasonable that they made you angry or upset at times. But if these politicians actually compromised your happiness, you are, at best, a foolish, infantile human being.

If this opinion makes you mad, I am truly sorry. Not because I care about your feelings, but because I pity how fragile you are. But before you call me out over the internet, please take a moment to read what I am actually saying.

I am NOT saying that you should be happy when politicians do things that you disagree agree with. Hell, I am beyond proud to live in a country where you can voice your opinion loudly yet peacefully, and where an armed populace holds the means to resist tyranny, should it arise in one of its many forms. And no, Obama and Trump aren’t tyrants (although both might be criminals. Damn it! I just pissed-off more people).

I am also not saying you should never get angry with politicians. Both Obama and Trump have done many things that should rightfully cause anger. I am also not saying that long-term unhappiness would be unreasonable with certain politicians. But believe me, Trump and Obama aren’t those politicians. And if you think that Trump or Obama is a modern-day Hitler or Stalin, you need a reality check that is beyond my ability to give.

What I am saying is that politicians are not responsible for your happiness. You are responsible for your happiness. Unfortunately, this FACT might also cause some people distress, but (you guessed it!) I don’t care. Only you can make you happy. Some people will make it easy for you to be happy, while other people will make it rather difficult. But even if the whole world is stacked against you, is still your responsibility to find happiness. Politicians take enough from us. Don’t let them take your happiness.

Thanks for reading. Now get off the toilet.

Going Beyond the “Brain in a Jar”

 

The holidays are here. Next week, many of you will be stressing-out about all the weight you gained. If I was your basic white girl from Instagram, I’d write a post that sympathizes with you, encouraging you to stay positive, eat healthy, and go for a jog.

Unfortunately, I am a “big-hairy-American-winning-machine” who wants you to gain weight. You probably aren’t eating enough food, or at least enough of the right foods. What does this have to do with a brain in a jar? I’ll get there in a minute.

Prior to writing this, I ate dinner. Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro played in the background while I proceeded to piss-off all the vegans in a 10 mile radius. On the menu was a 17 ounce steak, whole milk, oatmeal, and one big-ass bowl (a highly scientific measurement) of ice cream. This is not some one-off holiday binge. Dinner looks like this every night, with breakfast and lunch looking pretty similar (minus the ice cream). Most Americans are worrying about eating too many calories this week, yet my primary concern is that I’m not eating enough. What gives?

(A photo of my weekly beef-purchase from Walmart. Those tubes are five pounds each. There’s a reason vegans hate me.)

 I’ve been eating like this for over a year, and the results are unimpressive. I’m still more than 30 pounds underweight, tipping the scales at a measly 228 pounds, at a height of 5’ 9″. With all this food I’m eating, I am merely maintaining my bodyweight. It’s going to be a hard year of eating for me to get up to 260.

My thoughts on ideal bodyweight do not conform to conventional wisdom. The poster-child of a “fit” and “healthy” male my age is a lean 155-165 pounds (a good 100 pounds lighter than my goal). This person does moderate-intensity exercise four or five days a week, including some “strength” training. His diet is based on whole grains, low-fat dairy, some fruits and vegetables, and a minimal amount of meat.

What a load of crap. This diet and exercise plan (recommended by the American Heart Association, the American Council on Exercise, and other authorities) merely enables a “brain in a jar” existence. People following this plan are doing just-enough exercise to not die of a heart attack, and eating just enough food to fuel their largely-sedentary job (and largely-sedentary hobbies). They are, for all intents and purposes, living life as a brain in a jar.

(Brain in a jar. Sketch by Jennifer Mathis)

Last I checked, the ideal human existence did not consist of living as a “brain in a jar.” I don’t train because I’m scared of a heart attack. I train because I want to be a savage. I am quite attached to many intellectual and artistic pursuits, but we live in a physical world. As such, our physical existence is far more crucial than merely preventing a cardiac event. If you truly want to “get after it” in life, you will need to transform your physical existence beyond this brain in a jar.

When our physical condition languishes, our intellectual existence (and, if you’re into that sort of thing, our spiritual existence) will suffer. If this idea is offensive to you, feel free to crawl back to your “brain jar” and drift through life as you always have. If you have an open mind, please continue reading.

If our existence is a physical one, we must examine the nature of the physical interactions we have with our environment. Upon doing so, one finds that every physical effort you engage in, whether it is updating your Instagram or carrying an injured friend to safety, is a function of force production. Accordingly, your ability to exert force against resistance (aka strength) is the foundation of your physical existence. If you think I’m wrong, take a listen to Mark Rippetoe (FYI, he is much stronger than the guy in the thumbnail):

If our existence is undeniably physical, and strength is the foundation of our physical existence, we should obviously train our minds and bodies for strength. This beautiful piece of logic is, unfortunately, lost on many people, including most of the fitness community. But, if you are smarter than the fitness community, (trust me, you are), please note the following truth:  you cannot get strong with pushups, lunges, a small bodyweight, and skim (or, God forbid, soy) milk.

You need to lift big, and you need to eat big. This means a steady diet of beef, chicken, whole milk, and whole grains (fish is also acceptable, if you enjoy what Ron Swanson calls the “vegetables of meat”). You must also engage in a disciplined program of  heavy squats, presses, and pulls. This will make a man from any boy, and a woman from any girl. After a few months, when you’re deadlifting double your bodyweight for reps, you will no-longer be a brain in a jar, but a beast. A strong, articulate, intelligent beast.

If you are worried about the weight you gained over the holidays, take a moment to examine your physical existence. Are you living life as a brain in a jar? Are you a fat brain in a jar? That’s ok. It’s pretty common for most Americans. But if you want to take your existence beyond the “brain in a jar,” you need to get bigger and stronger. Quit stressing about the cookies, and start stressing about your squat and deadlift. I promise you’ll love the result.

 

 

Thanks for reading. Now get off the toilet.

A Character-Defining Moment

“Can you describe for me a character-defining moment?”

Six years ago, a man asked this question in an interview. I was just a 17-year-old kid, and wasn’t quite sure how to answer it. At the time, I felt that I’d never made any big decisions that took exceptional moral character. I was a nice-enough guy with a good work-ethic, but I’d never faced any complex moral dilemmas, or difficult ethical situations that one reads about in books.

Keeping par for the course, I gave a BS answer and moved on. The question, however, lurked in the back of my mind for years. Do I have any character-defining moments? Today, I still can’t answer the question. Instead, I’ve written it off as a stupid question for the following reason:

With the possible exception of committing capital crimes, character cannot be defined by a moment. Character can only be defined by one’s habits.

Most of today’s moral and ethical education misses this point. Instead, it chooses to focus on how to arrive at an ethical decision. It examines thought experiments (like the trolley problem) and explores solutions to complex moral quandaries. The topics are endless:  medical ethics, cyber ethics, the ethics of war, theories of justice, so on and so forth. Hell, my friend has a book about the ethics of The Big Lebowski (finally, a philosophy degree put to good use).

(The Big Lebowski, Ethan and Joel Cohen, Polygram Films International, Gramercy Pictures, 1998.)

Within these various topics, there are theories about how to arrive at ethical decisions. Kantian ethics looks at universal rules, and utilitarianism looks to quantify the good and evil (or pleasure and pain) of potential decisions. In the end, nobody agrees on much. This brings a question: how is a person supposed to define a moment of good moral character when the world’s best philosophers can’t decide on any ethical issue besides the fact that “Hitler was bad”?

I think that the answer lies in virtue. Aristotle is probably the greatest source on this topic, although some Catholic scholars would argue that Augustin or Aquinas earned that title. Oh well. They all agree that one’s character can be defined through their habits of virtue and vice. The virtues they seem to agree on are justice, courage, temperance, and practical wisdom. One’s character develops these virtues by thinking and acting accordingly, all-day-everyday, for life.

Those in utilitarian or Kantian camps often argue that Virtue Ethics cannot tell people how to act courageously or wisely. I’ve been told that that virtue merely tells us to be virtuous, that it can’t tell us how to act in a variety of situations. I think that this rebuttal is bullshit.

Do we really need 20,000 peer-reviewed journal articles to tell us that cheating and stealing are unjust, or that refusing to take responsibility for one’s actions is both unjust and cowardly? Does it really take a calculation of pleasure and pain to figure out that buying hookers and cocaine is neither wise nor temperate? When did ethics and character get so complicated?

Unfortunately, many scholars in the field of ethics would have you believe that it is complicated. However, the truth is that most of us will never face a complex moral dilemma that requires intense scrutiny. Seriously.

When was the last time you were faced with a lever that would kill 50 train passengers but save three kids stuck on the tracks? When was the last time someone put a gun to your head and forced you to choose between murdering either a child or his two parents? These scenarios do not happen every lifetime. A few people out of billions will ever face problems like these, but no amount of ethical education can tell you which decision is less evil. If you don’t believe me, try listening to a room full of utilitarian scholars debating a trolley problem. They will never reach a definitive answer, and your time would be better-spent bowling with Jeffrey Lebowski.

Instead of the complex ethical questions heard nowhere but philosophy class, our lives are largely made up of simple moral dilemmas:

“Should I speak up about my mistake, or let others suffer for it?”

“Should I lie about last quarter’s earnings, protecting our employees and shareholders, or should I tell the more difficult truth?”

“Should I fill out and file 50 pages of paperwork, facing the wrath of upper management, or can I sweep these HR complaints under the rug?”

“Should I get my work done tonight, or should I watch Dancing with the Stars?”

“Is it really necessary to have a beer at breakfast?”

I’ve been known to choose my vices with the last one. Nobody’s perfect, after all. The takeaway is that we don’t need a PHD to define and build good character. Good character comes from aggregating the small, simple-yet-difficult decisions one makes in life. These decisions make our habits, and these habits, not moments, define our character.

Thanks for reading. Now get off the toilet.