안락함의 위기: 쾌락, 고통, 현대의 불쾌감

### 쾌락과 고통의 역설: 편안함과 쾌락이 어떻게 고통으로 이어지고 고통을 추구하는 것이 어떻게 진정한 쾌락으로 이어질 수 있는가?
* 🌌 풍요로운 세상 속에서 많은 사람들이 전례 없는 편안함과 즐거움을 누리고 있음에도 불구하고 **만성적인 스트레스, 불안, 우울증, 신체적 쇠약**으로 힘들어하고 있습니다.
* 🏃 우리의 수렵 채집 조상들은 생존 전략으로 **편안함과 즐거움을 추구하는 본능적인 욕구**를 진화시켰습니다.
* 🌍 우리는 이러한 욕구를 물려받았지만, 이제 **안락함에 지나치게 탐닉할 위험**이 상존하는 풍요로운 환경에 살고 있습니다.
* 🎭 "편안함을 향한 인간의 끝없는 욕구와 편안함으로 가득 찬 세상 사이의 충돌로 인해 발생하는 위험 중 하나는 **마이클 이스터가 말하는 '편안함 크리프'**입니다."
* 🧠 우리의 뇌는 쾌락과 고통 사이의 균형을 유지하도록 연결되어 있으며, **쾌락에 장기간 또는 과도하게 빠지면 고통을 견디기 어렵게** 됩니다.
* 🛑 지나친 탐닉으로 인한 지속적인 고통은 절제를 통해 되돌릴 수 있습니다. 약 **4주 동안 '선택한 약물'을 절제**하고 나면 균형을 잃지 않는 단순한 쾌락을 즐길 수 있는 능력을 회복할 수 있습니다.
* 🔒 지나친 탐닉을 자제하는 데 도움을 주기 위해 자기 구속 기술을 사용하여 자신과 **"선택한 약물" 사이에 장벽**을 만들 수 있습니다.
* 💪 운동이나 도전적인 목표를 설정하고 노력하는 등 고통을 추구하면 **균형을 즐거움으로 바꾸고 더 행복하고 건강하게 만들 수 있습니다.**

지나친 편안함과 쾌락은 정신적, 육체적 불쾌감으로 이어져 힘과 기쁨을 위해 의도적으로 불편함을 감수해야 합니다.

In the 1st century AD, the Greek orator and philosopher Dio Chrysostom wrote: “Luxury makes pains seem even harder, and dulls and weakens one’s pleasures. For the person who is always luxuriating and never touches pain will end up unable to endure any pain at all, and also not able to feel any pleasure, not even the most intense.” Dio Chrysostom, Discourses. In the modern West, we have access to pleasures, comforts, and entertainments which kings of old could not have dreamed of. But with all this luxury, many people are chronically stressed, anxious, depressed, or struggling with physical debilitations. In this video, we explore the intimate connection between pleasure and pain and examine why too many comforts and pleasures are contributing to modern man’s mental and physical malaise. In his book The Comfort Crisis, Michael Easter writes: “We lack physical struggles…We have too many ways to numb out, like comfort food.

cigarettes, alcohol, pills, smartphones, and TV… we don’t have to deal with discomforts like working for our food, moving hard and heavy each day, feeling deep hunger, and being exposed to the elements. But we do have to deal with the side effects of our comfort: long-term physical and mental health problems.” - Michael Easter, The Comfort Crisis. To understand just how comfortable and pleasurable our lives are, we can contrast modern life to the realities our hunter-gatherer ancestors faced for much of human history. On a near daily basis, our ancestors walked miles to find water and forage food. They expended enormous amounts of energy bringing down large mammals, and regularly engaged in persistence hunting, which involved tracking and chasing prey until the animal collapsed in exhaustion. Once they made a kill, they would cut the animal up and walk miles back to camp carrying massive pieces of raw meat. Or as Michael Easter wrote: “Before we figured out animal husbandry and crop cultivation, we were essentially

professional athletes whose livelihood required
[us] to be physically active.” Our ancestors didn’t “work out,” because
nearly all of their waking hours were spent doing things that today we would classify
as exercise… Studies show it was not uncommon for these hunters to run and walk more than
25 miles in a day… The numbers suggest that our forefathers in just three-quarters of
a day logged more activity than most of us now do in a week or two. And they basically stayed at this activity
level until they died.” Michael Easter, The Comfort Crisis.
Along with intense physical activity, our ancestors endured mental stress without the
comforting panaceas of technology, drugs, processed foods, alcohol, and entertaining
distractions. They endured the elements of nature without
modern housing, air conditioning, or central heating, and they dealt with sickness and
infections without modern medicine. As their lives were difficult, often uncomfortable,
and sometimes outright painful, our ancestors.

evolved an instinctual drive to take full
advantage of the available comforts and pleasures. This drive was critical for their survival. Whenever possible, they would rest and relax,
and through this comfort-seeking, their minds and bodies would recover and find respite
from the harsh realities of life. When rich food sources, such as fatty meat,
fruit, or honey, were available, our ancestors would indulge to build up energy reserves,
as they did not always know when their next meal would be. “…our original comforts were negligible
and short-lived, at best. In an uncomfortable world, consistently seeking
a sliver of comfort helped us stay alive.” Michael Easter, The Comfort Crisis.
While we have inherited our ancestors’ drive for pleasure and comfort, this drive evolved
in environments of scarcity, and now we live in comfortable environments of abundance. “The modern comforts and conveniences that
now most influence our daily experience—cars, computers, television, climate control, smartphones,
ultraprocessed food, and more—have been

used by our species for about 100 years or
less. That’s around 0.03 percent of the time we’ve
walked the earth… Constant comfort is a radically new thing for us humans.” Michael Easter, The Comfort Crisis.
While few would want to return to the harsh conditions of our ancestors, the modern world
is presenting us with new challenges which stem from the fact that our drive for pleasure
and comfort did not evolve an off-switch – it is practically insatiable. Living in environments of scarcity, our ancestors
did not face the risk of overindulging themselves to a detrimental degree. But in our brave new world of abundance, overindulgence
is a constant threat. “We are cacti in the rain forest.” Dr. Tom Finucane.
One of the dangers arising from the clash between our insatiable drive for comfort and
our world teeming with comfort, is what Michael Easter calls comfort creep. Or as he explains:

“When a new comfort is introduced, we adapt to it, and our old comforts become unacceptable. Today’s comfort is tomorrow’s discomfort. This leads to a new level of what’s considered comfortable… What’s more, new comforts have moved the goalpost further away from what we consider an acceptable level of discomfort. Each advancement shrinks our comfort zones. The critical point… is that this all occurs unconsciously. We are terrible at noticing that comfort creep is consuming us and what it’s doing to us.” Comfort creep is most readily on display when it comes to physical comforts. As one example, due to the comforts of cars and delivery platforms, which make it possible to obtain any product or service we want or need without leaving home, increasing numbers of people are living a life of near total physical inactivity. Or as Michael Easter notes: “27 percent of us don’t do any type of physical activity at all. Literally nothing—life as a sort of prolonged shuffle from bed to office chair to sofa to

bed.” This physical comfort creep is a major cause
of the growing epidemic of obesity and chronic physical ailments that arise from living an
inactive life with a body which evolved to require high levels of activity to be healthy. “The human, simply put, was not designed
to sit all day.”, explained researchers at the Mayo Clinic. Or as Easter writes: “In our pursuit of better living, we’ve
allowed comfort to calcify our natural movements and strengths. Without conscious discomfort and purposeful
exercise—a forceful push against comfort creep—we’ll only continue to become weaker
and sicker.” Dr. Tom Finucane.
Along with the problem of comfort creep, modern pleasures are wreaking havoc on our mind and
body, as pain follows pleasure, like its shadow. In Dopamine Nation, the American psychiatrist
Anne Lembke writes that “one of the most remarkable neuroscientific findings in the
past century is that…pleasure and pain are processed in overlapping brain regions and
work via an opponent-process mechanism.

Another way to say this is that pleasure and
pain work like a balance.” Our brain is wired to maintain this pleasure-pain
balance in a state of equilibrium, in which neither the experience of pleasure nor pain
predominates for too long. Whenever there is a prolonged or excessive
imbalance to the side of pleasure or the side of pain, self-regulating mechanisms in our
brain seek to re-establish equilibrium by tipping the scales in the opposite direction. When we overindulge in pleasure, for example,
our brain follows our experience of pleasure with pain – be it physical pain or mental
and emotional anguish. Lembke explains that: “I tend to imagine this self-regulating
system as little gremlins hopping on the pain side of the balance to counteract the weight
on the pleasure side. The gremlins represent the work of homeostasis:
the tendency of any living system to maintain physiologic equilibrium.” Anne Lembke, Dopamine Nation
Or as the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche

observed in an aphorism titled “The Goal
of Science”: “What? The ultimate goal of science is to create
the most pleasure possible to man, and the least possible pain? But what if pleasure and pain should be so
closely connected that he who wants the greatest possible amount of the one must also have
the greatest possible amount of the other, that he who wants to experience the “heavenly
high jubilation,” must also be ready to be “sorrowful unto death”?” Nietzsche, The Gay Science.
If we habitually indulge in the same pleasures, we develop tolerance, and through a process
called “neuroadaptation”, our brain becomes overly sensitized to pain. Not only do we require more of a substance
or stimulus to feel the same amount of pleasure, but the pain we experience following pleasure
becomes more severe and longer-lasting. If we are too intemperate, eventually we reach
a point where overindulgence in unhealthy

food, pornography, video games, alcohol, drugs, or social media have tipped the scales to the side of pleasure for so long, and to such an extreme degree, that our pleasure-pain balance settles on the side of pain. When this happens, our drug of choice no longer gives us pleasure, but we are still driven to consume it to obtain temporary relief from enduring pain. For example, in a process called opioid-induced hyperalgesia, individuals experiencing pain who use opioids daily for over a month are at risk of developing a more intense pain condition than the one they were originally treating. “Why? Because exposure to opioids [causes] their brain to reset its pleasure-pain balance to the side of pain.” Anne Lembke, Dopamine Nation. Or as Lembke explains regarding the effects of any pleasurable activity or substance we habitually overindulge in: “The paradox is that hedonism, the pursuit of pleasure for its own sake, leads to anhedonia.

which is the inability to enjoy pleasure of
any kind… The relentless pursuit of pleasure (and avoidance of pain) leads to pain… When
our balance is tilted to the pain side, we crave our drug just to feel normal (a level
balance).” Anne Lembke, Dopamine Nation.
The good news is that we can reverse the enduring pain that arises from overindulgence through
abstinence. Lembke notes that in her clinical experience,
4 weeks of abstaining from our drugs of choice is sufficient, and that following such abstinence,
we regain the capacity to enjoy the simple pleasures of life which do not tip the scales
so far towards pleasure that they create an aftershock of pain. “Recovery begins with abstinence. Abstinence resets the brain’s reward pathway
and with it our capacity to take joy in simpler pleasures.” Anne Lembke, Dopamine Nation.
To help us in our quest for abstinence, we can utilize what Lembke calls techniques of
self-binding, which involve “intentionally

and willingly [creating] barriers between
ourselves and our drug of choice, in order to mitigate compulsive overconsumption.” (Anne Lembke, Dopamine Nation). Homer’s Odyssey
provides a mythological example of self-binding. In the realization that no man could resist
the seductive sounds of the Sirens, who lure men to death, Odysseus ordered his crew to
put beeswax in their ears and to tie himself to the mast of his ship. Odysseus understood that when a compulsion
for pleasure overtakes us, we can lose the capacity for voluntary choice. And so, if we are struggling with consuming
alcohol, drugs, or sugary foods, it is best not to keep any around and, if possible, create
obstacles that make it harder for us to purchase them. With respect to digital drugs, we can restrict
our consumption by setting a timer and only allowing ourselves to indulge for a certain
amount of time each day, or certain days of

the week. This latter method of self-binding was recommended
by Nietzsche as one of the most effective ways to stop compulsively overconsuming a
pleasure. In his aphorism titled “Self-mastery and
Moderation”, Nietzsche wrote: “…one can avoid opportunities for gratification
of the drive [for pleasure], and through long and ever longer periods of non-gratification,
weaken it and make it wither away. Then, one can impose upon oneself strict regularity
in its gratification: by thus imposing a rule upon the drive itself and enclosing its ebb
and flow within firm time-boundaries, one has then gained intervals during which one
is no longer troubled by it…” Nietzsche, The Dawn of Day.
Once we have managed to cease overindulging in pleasure, to further improve our life we
can voluntarily seek out pain. For just as the pursuit of too much pleasure

that involve temporary pain tips our pleasure-pain balance toward a more enduring experience of pleasure. Or as Lembke explains: “Pain leads to pleasure by triggering the body’s own regulating homeostatic mechanisms…. With intermittent exposure to pain, our natural hedonic set point gets weighted to the side of pleasure, such that we become less vulnerable to pain and more able to feel pleasure over time. “ Anne Lembke, Dopamine Nation. An obvious example of a healthy activity that exposes us to pain is physical exercise. Studies have shown that the positive mood that flows from the temporary pain of physical exercise even reduces cravings for unhealthy pleasures. Lembke notes that “high levels of physical activity in junior high, high school, and early adulthood predict lower levels of drug use. Exercise has also been shown to help those already addicted to stop or cut back.” Lembke references studies which show that cold water immersion triggers the release of neurotransmitters which improve our mood for hours after.

Setting lofty goals and struggling each day
to achieve them, or seeking out hard problems that involve mental, emotional, or physical
stress, can also temporarily tip the scales towards pain in a way that makes us happier,
healthier, and more capable of feeling pleasure. “…the self-controlled lover of pain…lives
a life that is far more pleasurable than his opposite…one’s pleasures are both greater
and less harmful whenever they occur with pain.” Dio Chrysostom, Discourses
The 4th century BC philosopher Diogenes the Cynic was such a firm believer that intentionally
seeking pain was the key to a good life, that he spent his days looking for ways to make
himself uncomfortable. He rolled over hot sand in the heat of the
summer, and in the winter walked barefoot in the snow and embraced statues covered in
ice. He slept in a clay storage jar, which was
referred to as his “tub”, and he sought

out emotional and psychological pain by intentionally
evoking the ridicule of others. He lived frugally, consuming the simplest
of foods, and he sometimes went for extended periods of time without eating – a practice
today we call intermittent fasting. Diogenes is recorded to have said, Despising
pleasure is the greatest of pleasures, and he claimed that by voluntarily seeking
out discomfort, he was able to enjoy his tub far more than the Persian ruler Xerxes enjoyed
his palace. Many throughout history have labeled Diogenes
a madman, but given what we now know about the intimate connection between pleasure and pain,
Diogenes was a man far ahead of his times. It is not that I am mad, it is only that
my head is different from yours. Diogenes the Cynic, Sayings and Anecdotes.
In our world of abundance, in which an unbridled pursuit of pleasure and comfort is crippling
minds, weakening bodies, and making increasing

numbers of people highly susceptible to pain,
we would be wise to follow the example of Diogenes and intentionally make our lives
a little more difficult, a little more uncomfortable, a little more painful, so that paradoxically,
we maximize our strength, pleasure, and joy. As Nietzsche put it, what we need is “a
bit of Cynicism, a little bit of the tub”. Or as the philosopher William Desmond wrote: True pleasure, the Cynics often contend, can
only be had by scorning it and by welcoming its opposite, pain. There will always be pain, and so rather than
escape it…one should grasp the serpent by the neck (Stob. 3.1.98), put out the fire
with one’s tongue, rush into the fray fearlessly, and fearlessly stare down the barking dog
(D. Chr. 8.17–19): that is, one should welcome pains as inevitable, love them…preparing
one for the pleasures of the satisfaction

that will come. Ponos, as both “pain” and “labour”, becomes the Cynics’ means for maximizing his pleasure. More paradoxically, pain is the cause of pleasure, and the Cynics are a strange breed of ascetic hedonists, or hedonistic ascetics. Or, rather, theirs is the hedonism of nature itself. William Desmond, Cynics

Pursue Pain, Not Pleasure - Why Comfort is Crippling You

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현대의 안락함이 정신적, 신체적 건강에 미치는 영향

디오 크리소스톰과 마이클 이스터는 과도한 안락함과 사치가 정신적, 육체적 웰빙에 미치는 해로운 영향을 강조합니다.

안락함과 쾌락으로 가득 찬 현대인의 삶은 수렵 채집 조상들의 고단하고 육체적으로 힘든 삶과 극명한 대조를 이룹니다.

마이클 이스터의 저서 '안락의 위기'는 현대 사회에서 육체적 노력은 부족하고 안락함만 넘쳐나면서 장기적인 건강 문제가 발생하고 있다고 강조합니다.

편안함을 추구하는 인간의 진화

우리 조상들은 생존 본능으로 쾌락과 안락함을 추구하며 휴식을 취하고 풍성한 음식을 탐닉하는 욕구를 발달시켰습니다.

그러나 이러한 욕구는 희소성이 있는 환경에서 진화한 반면, 우리는 풍요로운 세상에 살고 있기 때문에 과식의 위협이 끊임없이 존재합니다.

편안함에 대한 인간의 끝없는 욕구와 편안함이 가득한 세상 사이의 충돌로 인해 새로운 편안함이 끊임없이 편안함에 대한 정의를 바꾸고 무의식적으로 특히 신체 활동 측면에서 편안함의 영역이 감소하는 '편안함 크리프'가 발생하고 있습니다.

현대적인 편안함과 쾌적함이 심신에 미치는 영향

편안함과 현대적 쾌락은 앉아서 생활하는 라이프스타일과 뇌의 쾌락과 고통의 불균형을 초래하고 있습니다.

쾌락에 대한 지나친 탐닉은 고통에 대한 민감성을 높이고 같은 수준의 쾌락을 느끼기 위해 더 많은 자극을 필요로 하게 하여 궁극적으로 신체적, 정신적 건강에 영향을 미칠 수 있습니다.

뇌의 자기 조절 메커니즘은 장기간의 쾌락에 대응하기 위해 작동하여 불균형과 잠재적인 건강 문제의 순환으로 이어집니다.

과도한 쾌락 추구가 통증 균형에 미치는 영향

쾌락에 지나치게 탐닉하면 뇌의 균형이 통증 쪽으로 이동하여 쾌락을 경험하지 못하고 중독성 물질이나 활동에 대한 갈망이 증가하게 될 수 있습니다.

선택한 약물을 절제하면 이러한 통증 불균형을 되돌리고 일상에서 소소한 즐거움을 즐길 수 있는 능력을 회복할 수 있습니다.

강박적 소비를 줄이기 위한 장벽을 만드는 등의 자기 구속 기술은 금주를 달성하고 자발적 통제력을 회복하는 데 도움이 될 수 있습니다.

충만한 삶을 위한 자기 통달과 고통의 힘

니체는 쾌락의 과잉 소비를 극복하기 위한 방법으로 자기 구속을 권장했습니다.

신체 운동의 예에서 볼 수 있듯이 자발적으로 고통을 추구하면 보다 지속적인 쾌락 경험으로 균형을 맞추는 데 도움이 될 수 있습니다.

안네 렘케, 디오 크리소스톰과 같은 철학자들과 고대 철학자 디오게네스 냉소주의자는 모두 고통을 의도적으로 수용하는 것이 더 행복하고 건강한 삶을 위해 중요하다고 믿었습니다.

디오게네스의 지혜: 쾌락을 위해 고통을 받아들이기

고대 철학자 디오게네스는 불편함과 고통을 추구하는 데서 즐거움을 찾았는데, 이는 오늘날 힘과 기쁨을 극대화하는 방법으로 이해되고 있습니다.

쾌락을 지나치게 추구하는 오늘날의 세상에서 고통을 포용하는 그의 철학은 심신을 강화하는 방법으로 여겨지고 있습니다.

디오게네스의 접근 방식은 역설적으로 고통을 만족과 쾌락을 얻기 위한 수단으로 간주하며, 독특한 형태의 금욕적 쾌락주의를 대표합니다.