Comment by kulahan
9 hours ago
> do nothing after work. why do you have to do something after work? do something because you feel like doing it, not because you feel like you have to.
Escapism. You SHOULD feel like you have to do some stuff. Our bodies are always aiming to relax, because conserving calories is an extremely effective survival method. We are hardwired to do nothing, in order to escape the burden of instead doing something.
> Escapism. You SHOULD feel like you have to do some stuff.
This word keeps coming up, coupled with things unrelated.
The OP isn't saying "do nothing". He's saying "do what you want to do". If he wants to study mathematics, that's neither escapism nor "doing nothing".
The extreme majority of people don’t have some secret massive project they want to do and are weirdly choosing not to. There’s only one way to interpret this.
Nope, they might just want to clock out from work at 5pm and go ride their bike until sunset without giving a single shit about anything but the fresh air. Or go home and walk their kid to the park. Or throw a ball around the yard with the dog.
3 replies →
>There’s only one way to interpret this.
obviously not.
> There’s only one way to interpret this.
In any context, this is about as trivially false as any non-tautological statement can be.
Most people's "secret massive project they want to work on" is their family
If everyone would be ready to jump in and help you with some revolutionary project you should really bother to figure out what that project is going to be.
They are not ready to help because normal life is designed to be absurdly complicated, time consuming, constraining and draining.
The irony is that the solution is for people to take up massive projects that address the many angles of needless complexity [again]
> You SHOULD feel like you have to do some stuff.
Gregor: It would be nice to do something.
Sam: We are doing something. We're sitting here, waiting.
"Ronin", 1998
Sitting sometimes is good, sitting always is not.
Your body is, maybe, but we're not all the same. Making my body sit still and do nothing requires sustained, focused attention; action is the comfort state, and idleness the burden.
Meanwhile, my idleness is so ingrained that sometimes I can't even make myself do the things I WANT to do, like load up a game that I've been wanting to play.
And I'm just tired...all the time. I do nothing and still I'm exhausted.
FWIW, I've been there too. One thing to realize is that action precedes motivation. The idea is to train yourself to do things you _don't_ want to do.
You have authority over your body. You can tell it to do things it doesn't want to.
You can walk into your bathroom and take a cold shower right now, on purpose. Your body doesn't want to, but it will yield if your mind tells it to.
In fact, doing that will switch up your state into a different one, which is half of the work needed to feel better.
Do you know why? It might be worth figuring out. For me is is mild ME/CFS but for you maybe not (a good tell for CFS is if doing any exercise at all e.g. 1km walk makes you feel rough later. Not delayed muscle soreness or a stitch but more like a flu say).
So many other things are possible like iron, thyroid, sleep apnea, ADHD, depression or burnout, long COVID, tropical illness. Maybe more.
Finally it is totally morally OK not to be a 100% productive worker bee. A "cure" is not necessary but might be worth rabbit holing if you desire and have the energy.
That is pretty typical of depression, especially if you can't make yourself do activities you normally would enjoy or you stop feeling as much enjoyment from them
Unfortunately I have no advice for it but I wish you good luck. We're all struggling lately
Call that conserving energy. Contrary to commonly-held belief, calories are a very ambiguous concept.
tell that to someone with an eating disorder.
Or maybe people like to stare at the clouds while herding sheep. This is just bro-science half-baked evolutionary psychology bullshit.
Personally I enjoy listening to the birds with a book in my hands.