Well-Being isn't the Goal

Even if Pandemonium is Horrible

I have been feeling a bit of resistance towards writing recently. This post is written for myself — an exploration of meaning, purpose, joy and creation. I like it, even if it’s a bit “out there”. I hope you enjoy it as well

I can choose well-being.

I start by taking slow breaths, calming down and becoming more aware of what’s happening in & around me. The breaths grow deeper over time, bringing about a sense of expansion.¹ I expand physically, straightening my back and expanding my chest. I expand mentally, feeling a sense of vastness — like facing a vast open field, stretching towards the horizon.²

My breath starts feeling pleasurable, like a warm summer breeze flowing into me, invigorating my core. It becomes easy to love — radiating agapic positive intent in the rhythm of my breathing. I gain an increased awareness of my reactions to things, finding it easier to react skillfully.³

The sensations can increase in a loop — with pleasure and good intent leading to further pleasure and good intent. If I focus on the pleasure, it intensifies, a strong buzzing/tingling sensation with a sense of pleasurable vertigo — the sensation of dropping down an amusement park ride.⁴

Non-Desirability of Pure Pleasure

Strangely enough, I don’t desire this pleasure. I go long periods forgetting I can choose well-being. I use it mostly instrumentally, to get rid of stress, anxiety and grumpiness — creating a stable base to act from.

I’ve started thinking of happiness as another physical need. I eat when I’m hungry, sleep when I’m tired and choose happiness when I feel down. It’s important, much like air and water. Depressed people sometimes over-focus on happiness — like desert-dwellers hyper-focused on water.

Fulfilling activities usually involve some degree of pleasure/well-being — but I don’t think of it as an end goal. Once you are hydrated, water ceases to be a goal in itself.⁵ The non-desirability of pure pleasure is echoed in

Sasha Chapin

’s post on jhanas.⁶ In the post, Sasha writes:

I think naively we often assume that what people want is to feel the state of happiness, primarily. And, if you don’t experience much sensual pleasure, then occasional moments of bliss can seem like The Point, like the main thing that stands between you and a good life. But this is a completely impoverished view of human behavior, which assumes that an obviously salient part of experience can substitute for the whole of experience. It’s sort of like imagining that licking a bunch of sugar cubes would be as satisfying as eating a slice of apple pie.

Hedonium Considered Harmful

Naturally, this makes me think of hedonium. I’ll give you a brief explanation.

Some hardcore utilitarians want to fill the universe with computers, and simulate pleasurable experiences on them. Pick a simulation that has the highest pleasure per computation resource — maybe a frog-orgasm on heroin — and fill the universe with a simulated repeating 5-second amphibian orgy.⁷ This way, you maximize the amount of pleasure in the universe, which has got to be good, right?

This idea has always chafed with me. A universe dedicated to frog orgies feels about as exciting as a universe filled with paperclips. If someone seriously considered transforming the universe into a homogenous “maximum value” ideal, I would do almost anything to stop them.

At the same time, there’s a great argument for the benefits of hedonium. We start by asserting that simulated minds ought to have rights. If someone created a simulated copy of my mind, I’d object if the copy would be subjected to simulated torture.

If an mad scientist created evil hedonium — pandemonium? — filling the universe with simulations of me getting tortured, I would consider that a dick move. Hedonium is neutral/boring, while pandemonium is actively abhorrent.

This ends up with a conundrum. If a pandemonium universe would be very bad, doesn’t it follow that the inverse must be really good? How can simulated torture be actively bad, while simulated pleasure is neutral/boring?

This argument presupposes that pleasure & pain are symmetric inverses of each other, each carrying opposite moral weights. I don’t think this is true. Torture stops 99.99%+⁸ of the population from having a good time. Pleasure and well-being are part of most fun things (90%+?), but they’re not goals in themselves.⁹

Reflections

Some people want a steady-state endgame for the reachable universe. Usually, these people are dissatisfied with the state of things — they find meaning by furthering their ideals. Ironically, they find meaning in reaching, rather than the steady-state goal.

This is all captured in this beautiful movie quote:

We should not concern ourselves with pursuit of happiness — but happiness of pursuit
— Professor Coreman

Using the practice described above, I create a stable ground for the happiness of pursuit. I go into a state I think of as “The Joy Of Creation”, a state where the natural flow of things takes me out on adventures. I grow as a person, exploring with curiosity and enthusiasm. I feel inspired to contribute to things greater than myself, working to shape the future in a positive direction. It's an active, dynamic state - the opposite of stagnation.

There’s a corrupted version of this — when pursuit morphs into relentless, soul-crushing performance anxiety. Pushing yourself towards a goal in an unenjoyable way is a great way to lose touch with meaning and purpose. Taken too far, people start rejecting ambition as inherently damaging. These people want everything to stop, ending up in a steady state. They want to be done — vacation, retirement, death.

Killing the spark of joyful action is a horrible thing, akin to lobotomy. Striving for a pleasant steady state is misguided — a slave moral search for purposeless comfort.

I prefer to get into a good relationship with action and purpose —finding a solid base of enjoyment, a firmament for the Happiness of Pursuit & the Joy of Creation.

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P.S: I’d love to hold space while you reflect on big topics in your life.

Here’s a statement from my client Frans-Lukas, shared with his consent:

“I've attended Jonathan's philosophical guidance sessions four times, and the experience has been transformative. […] I often share the concepts discovered in Jonathan's sessions with my friends, and they've significantly impacted my life.“

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Here are some other people writing about pleasure/happiness as a non-intrinsic goal:

• Jim Dalrymple II
  - Maybe happiness isn’t the point of life

• Jannik Lindquist
  - Stoicism and pleasure

• David Pinsof
  - Happiness is Bullshit

• Peter N Limberg
  - Fuck You Happiness

1. Based on

Michael Ashcroft

’s teachings of the alexander technique

2. Do other people do this? Look at a vast view, and “opening up”/making yourself big. It feels like expanding into the vast openness, a wonderful feeling.

3. My neighbour started playing the “Pirates of the Caribbean” theme on a flute, and I love it.

4. I’m not sure why I can do this. I’ve been experimenting with many different things, and it’s hard to nail down the source. I’ve been practising mindset-shifting through my “cosy meditation”. I’ve experienced heightened states of well-being and love during Circling, potentially making it easier to tap into.

I’ve also done a bit of Alexander Technique, as well as metta and supplement-enhanced meditations described in this post. I’ve been on and off meditation, moving from focus meditation to open-awareness meditation a la Chapman.

5. Water is important, and you function better while hydrated — similar to happiness. But claiming that happiness and well-being are ends to themselves is like claiming that we exist to make sure we keep optimal hydration levels, to me.

6. I am not familiar enough with Buddhism to know whether the phenomena described in this post is related to Jhanas. It’s about a mindful/blissful state, regardless.

7. This is a bit of a strawman. Some utilitarians do think like this, while others categorize pleasure into higher and lower. Generally, many people in the world suffer. Increasing wellbeing is good, in much the same way it’s good to make sure everyone has water to drink.

It’s only when a nice direction turns into a steady-state goal that I get scared. We are not utility maximizers — any absolute steady-state goal is likely to end up monstrous.

8. What percentage of the population is enlightened enough to vibe with torture?

9. This is basically just an echo of sashas argument, hopefully it’s extreme enough to be fun and help underscore the idea.