Never Isolate Part 2
When I walk into a restaurant buffet, I always get really excited. There are so many choices from which to choose from and I wont even have to limit myself to one selection. Not only that, but there is no limit on how much I can take. I will be able to eat as much as I want, whatever I want...
I quickly fill my plate up with all kinds of different foods. I sit down and begin to eat. But there is so much I would like to try that I simply don't know what to try next. I shove the food in my mouth because I know that as soon as I finish chewing this bite, the next one will be the most spectacular tasting bite...
After twenty minutes I get full. I stare at my fourth helping with wariness. I start to wonder whether I enjoyed the meal as much as I thought I would. If I were to try and locate which bites were the enjoyable ones, I'm not so sure I would be able to answer. Any bite I took was only a precursor, a preview for the next bite or the next piece which was the one that really mattered. If I were to draw it out in a diagram it would look like this;
Beginning Super excited
Sit Down Eat frantically to get to the next bite
5 minutes Eat frantically to get to the next bite
10 Minutes Eat quickly so these that I really liked.
Twenty Minutes Later Stomach ache
Is food just not something enjoyable, or did I just relate to it improperly? If so, then what is the proper way of viewing food. What in me is causing my mistaken view?
I will share another example, but this one based on second hand knowledge on how someone who enjoys clothes feels like when they walk into a shopping mall.
The Shopping Mall
When you want into a clothing store you get particularly excited. The selection is huge and there is so many great “outfits” to find. Like in the example of the buffet, you go around trying everything on. When you walk out of the store with your one purchase you are pretty content. However, in no way would you say that your experience measured up to the excitement with which you entered the store.
Why was that original excitement never fully satisfied by the experience? Is your view of the experience of shopping incorrect?
Fantasy
On a simple level the disappointment in both experiences can be attributed to our faculty of imagination and fantasy. We have a certain fantasy of how great the food will taste like, and how beautiful the clothes will look. Reality never lives up to our imagination so it is not a surprise that we will always be disappointed. But how do these fantasies work?
It is Mine for Keeps- the isolationist point of view
The incorrect perception of either experience stems from a similar problem that our pasuk in Mishlei addressed, the mistake of isolating experiences. The “isolated”perception, is viewing a pleasure as something that can be grabbed onto, and kept. It is the feeling that this pleasure will be a thing to have, and that it is not just a passing feeling.
To further understand this fantasy it is useful to consider a third type of isolationism, the isolation of experiences. I will then tie in and connect the two types of fantasies.
Isolation of Experiences
All school kids eagerly await the day that they will finish school. They will graduate and be free from the authority figures that force them to wake up early in the morning and sit all day in a claustrophobic room. Graduation night is the pinnacle, of this achievement of freedom. It is a defining moment that causes this change in me from being “a kid who goes to school” to FREE!!!!...or at least that is the fantasy kids have.
I remember my own graduation. It was extremely boring and I kept waiting for it to end. After a few hours it was over, but I felt no internal change. Not only did I not feel like someone different, but I wasn't even as excited to have graduated as I had always imagined myself to be. I was expecting a grand spectacle but it had just passed, with me feeling like an observer.
My mistake in this case was viewing this experience as an isolated incident. Graduation was a destination point in my life, so I expected it to feel like a destination point. But that simply was not true. It was just another experience that passed after a few hours without any drastic changes in who I really was.
This fantasy of isolating experiences can be very dangerous. People comfort themselves from their unhappiness in the present by focusing on a future event that will make them happy. How many times have you heard someone say, “just wait till ____ happens, then everything will be great”. They get what they have been waiting for but they immediately start looking forward to the next thing. In other words, humans always live with a fantasy about the future. But what that fantasy really is, is an isolationist view of experiences. It is a belief that once this "destination" is reached the person will always be content.
The very same thing happens in how we view pleasures. We view them as destinations and therefore we expect them to feel like destinations. When we walk into the buffet we expect the ultimate pleasure of food to be reached and kept forever. This is a false view. Nothing is isolated and everything is bound to the changes of time. We will always be disappointed because our fantasy of reaching an "acquisition of pleasure for keeping" is simply not true.
in the next post I will address how I think a person can overcome this fantasy in specific areas of his life. I will give more examples to show how far this isolationist perspective really pervades our view of reality. I will also try to tackle the question of what is the proper view of pleasures, experiences, and consequences? Stay tuned! .
I quickly fill my plate up with all kinds of different foods. I sit down and begin to eat. But there is so much I would like to try that I simply don't know what to try next. I shove the food in my mouth because I know that as soon as I finish chewing this bite, the next one will be the most spectacular tasting bite...
After twenty minutes I get full. I stare at my fourth helping with wariness. I start to wonder whether I enjoyed the meal as much as I thought I would. If I were to try and locate which bites were the enjoyable ones, I'm not so sure I would be able to answer. Any bite I took was only a precursor, a preview for the next bite or the next piece which was the one that really mattered. If I were to draw it out in a diagram it would look like this;
Beginning Super excited
Sit Down Eat frantically to get to the next bite
5 minutes Eat frantically to get to the next bite
10 Minutes Eat quickly so these that I really liked.
Twenty Minutes Later Stomach ache
Is food just not something enjoyable, or did I just relate to it improperly? If so, then what is the proper way of viewing food. What in me is causing my mistaken view?
I will share another example, but this one based on second hand knowledge on how someone who enjoys clothes feels like when they walk into a shopping mall.
The Shopping Mall
When you want into a clothing store you get particularly excited. The selection is huge and there is so many great “outfits” to find. Like in the example of the buffet, you go around trying everything on. When you walk out of the store with your one purchase you are pretty content. However, in no way would you say that your experience measured up to the excitement with which you entered the store.
Why was that original excitement never fully satisfied by the experience? Is your view of the experience of shopping incorrect?
Fantasy
On a simple level the disappointment in both experiences can be attributed to our faculty of imagination and fantasy. We have a certain fantasy of how great the food will taste like, and how beautiful the clothes will look. Reality never lives up to our imagination so it is not a surprise that we will always be disappointed. But how do these fantasies work?
It is Mine for Keeps- the isolationist point of view
The incorrect perception of either experience stems from a similar problem that our pasuk in Mishlei addressed, the mistake of isolating experiences. The “isolated”perception, is viewing a pleasure as something that can be grabbed onto, and kept. It is the feeling that this pleasure will be a thing to have, and that it is not just a passing feeling.
To further understand this fantasy it is useful to consider a third type of isolationism, the isolation of experiences. I will then tie in and connect the two types of fantasies.
Isolation of Experiences
All school kids eagerly await the day that they will finish school. They will graduate and be free from the authority figures that force them to wake up early in the morning and sit all day in a claustrophobic room. Graduation night is the pinnacle, of this achievement of freedom. It is a defining moment that causes this change in me from being “a kid who goes to school” to FREE!!!!...or at least that is the fantasy kids have.
I remember my own graduation. It was extremely boring and I kept waiting for it to end. After a few hours it was over, but I felt no internal change. Not only did I not feel like someone different, but I wasn't even as excited to have graduated as I had always imagined myself to be. I was expecting a grand spectacle but it had just passed, with me feeling like an observer.
My mistake in this case was viewing this experience as an isolated incident. Graduation was a destination point in my life, so I expected it to feel like a destination point. But that simply was not true. It was just another experience that passed after a few hours without any drastic changes in who I really was.
This fantasy of isolating experiences can be very dangerous. People comfort themselves from their unhappiness in the present by focusing on a future event that will make them happy. How many times have you heard someone say, “just wait till ____ happens, then everything will be great”. They get what they have been waiting for but they immediately start looking forward to the next thing. In other words, humans always live with a fantasy about the future. But what that fantasy really is, is an isolationist view of experiences. It is a belief that once this "destination" is reached the person will always be content.
The very same thing happens in how we view pleasures. We view them as destinations and therefore we expect them to feel like destinations. When we walk into the buffet we expect the ultimate pleasure of food to be reached and kept forever. This is a false view. Nothing is isolated and everything is bound to the changes of time. We will always be disappointed because our fantasy of reaching an "acquisition of pleasure for keeping" is simply not true.
in the next post I will address how I think a person can overcome this fantasy in specific areas of his life. I will give more examples to show how far this isolationist perspective really pervades our view of reality. I will also try to tackle the question of what is the proper view of pleasures, experiences, and consequences? Stay tuned! .
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