Out of all the Marvel superheroes ever created, there has never been a superhero whose super power is inflicting the same pain on to someone as equal to or more than the pain he or she has inflicted upon others. Think about that. If we all personally felt the pain we inflicted upon others, we might just have a shot at world peace! One thing is for certain: for some reason the “Golden Rule” we all learned during our wonder years is just too hard to master: “Simply put, if you wouldn’t want it done to you, don’t to it to others.”
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| Me as a Superhero with my sidekick Bellarina |
Why is the Golden Rule so challenging? Western culture has quickly become, for many, a hedonic treadmill, a manmade pseudo magical solution to instantly dissolve all sadness through never ending gratification and pleasure. It’s this never ending quest to fill a void, of chasing an ideal of bigger and better and newer that will never feed the soul, only temporarily tickle the ego.
“Success” in western culture isn’t the equivalent to a moral metric or inner journey compared to eastern culture, and therefore in the quest for success in America, one can risk losing his soul. In fact, it’s easy to see that a lot of successful people have no moral compass. Success on paper can look very different to who a person really is. It’s important to never confuse the two.
What keeps someone on the hedonic treadmill? One word: Entitlement. Entitlement is a state of being where one feels deserving of all the benefits without sacrificing or actually doing anything. It’s the delusional state of being that mentally removes you from the reality of yourself and who you really are - so you never have to face that person in the mirror. When it’s entirely too painful to accept the person you are, that’s when you escape into the delusional world of entitlement and hedonism.
If you’ve ever come into contact with an entitled person, you come to realize these people look at the world much differently. They view authenticity, honestly, kindness, and trust as things that can get you screwed in life. Entitled people are terribly broken and feel constantly as if they should get everything they desire no matter who it hurts. Entitled people can’t tolerate even the most minor inconveniences and react with outbursts of anger and chronic complaining and negativity.
Fueling this never ending hedonic cycle, social media and the internet are relentlessly exposing its product to the end user, you. They try to make it addictive, a dopamine hit, to view carefully curated top locations with filtered ridiculously good looking models doing amazing things 24/7. In a nutshell, social media spoon-feeds carefully curated bullshit to users to hook them, make them jealous, unappreciative, and envious of what others don’t really have. The truth is life is sometimes mundane and uneventful, even sometimes sad and miserable, but that doesn’t sell or keep people logged on.
Think of this way. Social media is free. So how do they make billions off of users if it’s free. Zuckerberg, alone, is worth $111.6 billion by ripping off and stealing the idea of Facebook from his college friends. The Social Network is on Netflix if you’re interested in how he screwed people. Trust me, it’s not the ads…to answer my own question. They sell us and our information!
So, entitled people buy in to this social media non-reality, else they are left to face their reflection and deeply feel like a loser. Entitled people can temporarily erase baggage and pain with more and more entitlement and become an asshole using other people, even close family and friends, as a means to an end to keep on the hedonic treadmill, knowing full well as soon as it stops, they’re left to feel the even deeper gaping empty hole. The fact is, when the treadmill stops, the entitled person is left to see they are alone with no fulfilling relationships and are more empty than when they first got on.
At some point in every entitled person’s life there starts to be a plateau where suddenly there are diminishing returns on chronically new experiences. This means they start losing more and more as they pant to stay on the machine! However the more entitled people refuse to commit to people and places always running for more, more, more - eventually there is nowhere else to run. Hence, the metaphor of the treadmill. There is no final destination until the entitled person chooses to slow down and finally get off the treadmill and take responsibility for their pain and the pain they inflicted on others.
The fact is we are not supposed to be happy all the time. When we are happy, we never change! Think of cross fit. Negative events in our life are often the catalyst for change and the cross training we need for a new and improved outlook of personal responsibility. Also, negative emotions are often more useful because we can’t always trust our positive emotions. Ever heard the phrase, “love is blind?”
Just like the Law of Attraction, there is the Law of Avoidance. What this means is that people will avoid growing or experiencing an action or experience in direct proportion to how much it threatens their own identity or view of the world. Therefore change forces us to give up part of our identity. This is why change is hard for many people. And those of us who have been through lots of change know how to roll with the punches without it threatening our core identity. Avoiding losing control or having to be 100% certain about every single thing in life can make a person start to manipulate, use and string other people along.
What’s the solution? This is western culture now. While there is hope for reformation, after all, I am a reformed liberal, moody entitled people will continue on in destroying their own lives and hurting people. Enter stage left, Captain Karma. While there is no Marvel superhero, karma is very real. The Beatles wrote the lyrics, “and in the end, the love you make, is equal to the love you take.” I firmly believe, as a Christian, karma is very real the pain you make is also equal to the pain you take. And, what comes around, goes around. You will eventually reap what you sow in this life. So, love fiercely, because this all ends.
In reflection of approaching Black Friday, I leave you with this:
Love,
Kimmie
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