William B. Irvine has come up with a concept of a BIS (Biological Incentive System). It may explain a great deal of the food issues. If we desire food, it is the food we need or something else, or specifically one component? On Desire, why we want what we want, is an interesting read.
I am an eccentric, according to this book, and I always knew that, sort of. There are a few things that the author stops short of saying, ie, the cause of desire is emotional, intellectual, psychological, and I will add chemical and physiological. Some desire are just there naturally in individuals. There is nothing we can do, they are just there. If it happens to be eating, we need to expect obesity, and now there is the issue of learning to live while going against our nature. That is the problem.
Now how do I overcome this issue? .... Move the resisting desire from intellectual to emotional drive desire to get stronger motivation.... but how does one do that? ....
Jeez Fred
ReplyDeleteYou take this stuff real deep, not that it isn’t cool, but it’s beyond me a lot of the time. Sometimes we can spend a lifetime looking for something and when we find it, we wonder why. I suppose we all want security in all its forms. I have posted this a few times, it has made sense to me for a long time, not that I did not spend most of my life fitting in, and trying to conform. Many years ago, and when a young man, I read a book by the actor Sterling Hayden called the Wanderer. It had a profound effect on me then, and to this day . A passage from this great book.
“So it is no wonder that the mass of people regard the wanderer as a cross between a romantic vagabond and an irresponsible semi-ne’er-do-well who can’t-or won’t-fit in. Which is not to say that those who are fated to stay at home and toe the line do not look at the wanderer with envy and, yes, even awe, for he is doing what they would like to be doing, and something tells them they will never do it unless they either “strike it rich” or retire -and once retirement rolls around, chances are it will be too late. They know that too.
This would seem to mean that the whole thing is largely a matter of luck, with which I would be the first to agree, having been blessed with good fortune through most of my working life. But I would be remiss if I didn’t add that if you want to wander, you’re going to have to work at it and give up the one thing that most non-wanderers prize so highly-the illusion of security.
I say “illusion” because the most “secure” people I’ve encountered are, when you come right down to it, the least secure once they have been removed from job and home and bank account. While those unfortunate enough to be locked into some despised and unrewarding job are even worse off. And if I have been favoured with good luck all down the years, I can also quickly single out scores of men and women spread around this beleaguered old world who, without “luck”, have managed to live lives of freedom and adventure (that curious word) beyond the wildest dreams of the stay-at-homes who, when fresh out of school, opted for that great destroyer of men’s souls, security.”
In my opinion a truly great book, and the way I try to live my life. I have often failed but I try.
ISBN 978-1-57409-048-2
Eddie
Nothing wrong with being eccentric, nothing wrong with being what you as an individual are. If we have a problem we should do what we can to solve it, we don't always but trying is the main thing
ReplyDeleteJosh