The One You Feed - A Teaching, a Song, and a Poem 03/22/2019

Episode Date: March 22, 2019

A Teaching, a Song, and a PoemSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I'm Jason Alexander. And I'm Peter Tilden. And together, our mission on the Really Know Really podcast is to get the true answers to life's baffling questions like why the bathroom door doesn't go all the way to the floor, what's in the museum of failure, and does your dog truly love you? We have the answer. Go to reallyknowreally.com

and register to win $500, a guest spot on our podcast, or a limited edition signed Jason bobblehead. The Really Know Really podcast. Follow us on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, everyone. This is a episode that I record for Patreon supporters every week. It's called a teaching a song and a poem and usually a bad joke. And I release it once a week to Patreon supporters, people who are members at the $10 a month level. So if you would like to get access to these more regularly than periodically when I drop them in the main feed, you can go to oneufeed.net slash support and you get access to

these. You can also get access to all the post-show conversations that I have with guests that are available only to Patreon members, as well as ad-free episodes. So again, if you're interested in all of those benefits, plus you want the heart-lifting joy of supporting something that you love and care about, then go to oneufeed.net support. And here is an episode of a teaching, a song, oneufeed.net slash support. And here is an episode of A Teaching, A Song, and A Poem. I hope you enjoy it. Hello, everybody. Back again with A Teaching, A Poem, and a song. And thank you for supporting the show. Thank you for your generous, generous, generous contributions and enabling us to do what we do.

All right. Our teaching this week is on something called the Hedonic Adaptation Prevention Model prevention model by Sheldon Bohm and I can never say the woman's name. It's spelled L-Y-U-B-O-M-I-R-S-K-Y. So someone else can try and pronounce that. But what's interesting is we've all heard the term hedonic adaptation, or if you haven't, you've at least probably heard the term hedonic treadmill, right? We keep wanting new and different things. We get what we want, we want more, we want more. And so this model sort of lays out how this happens. And it really comes in two major components, right? The first is a bottom-up process in which positive emotions from positive life change decline over time. Essentially, you get too accustomed to the positive stimulus, taking it for granted and

considering it as the new standard or new normal. This is the person who wins the lottery and goes back to being as happy as they were not too long after. Now it's important to note that this is a positive thing too. This appears to be, has an evolutionary function and the positive side of it is that we do the same thing with negative stimuli. If something bad happens to us, it's really bad for a while, but we eventually adapt and get back to a normal place. But when we're trying to deal with positive emotions or happiness, this is a little bit of a challenge. So we become accustomed to what we already have, taking it for granted. And then the second problem is a top-down process in which we increase our aspirations in order to sustain or improve positive emotions. As we become more accustomed to the positive stimulus, we begin to seek novelty or demand

more from the stimuli in order to sustain the same level of happiness. And I see this happening in my own life, and I'm kind of right in the midst of it, right? And so I'll give you an example. I guess we're all right in the midst of it, but here's my example, right? I left work not too long ago, six months ago now, seven months ago, in order to do the show full time, which was something that I had been dreaming of for a long time. And by and large, it is wonderful. But I need to remind myself to appreciate it and enjoy it because it just becomes the new normal. And so I'm constantly having to take time to look at it and make sure that I appreciate it over and over again and then the other thing that can happen and this has happened as good things happen to the show like we get a certain number of listeners I'll think if well if we get to this

level or we get to that level this amount contribution, then everything will be great. But of course, I get there. And then if I'm not careful, that top down process I talked about is I immediately increase the aspiration. It's suddenly like, well, I got that. And now I need the next thing. Now, some of this is at work in the general human condition. And we've talked about it. Rainn Wilson called it the if then model of happiness, right? If I get this, then I'll be happy, and we've talked about it. Rainn Wilson called it the if-then model of happiness, right? If I get this, then I'll be happy, which we of course know doesn't work. We get it, and then we're not happy. But I think that this for us to think about is helpful because it tells us a couple things. One is it tells us we have to continue to reflect on the blessings we

have and really try and appreciate them. Secondly, I think it points to the fact that variety and novelty is important in life. There's a first century writer, Pabilia Cirrus, who observed that no pleasure endures unseasoned by variety. And so you can apply this any aspect of your life. I came across this most recently in an article about applying this model to relationships. And so what is it in relationships? Well, it's to continue to appreciate the good things of your partner, not take them for granted, recognize that like, okay, this is really great. And then secondly, is to try and introduce some novelty into the relationship.

Don't just come home and do the same thing every night, sit on the couch, like do things together because that introduces some degree of novelty and resists this hedonic adaptation. So that is the teaching for this week, the hedonic adaptation model. So I hope that is helpful. And now the poem, as I mentioned last week, we're doing Mary Oliver for the next four weeks. So this is week two of Mary Oliver, and this poem is called Morning Poem. Every morning, the world is created. Under the orange sticks of the sun, the heaped ashes of the night turn into leaves again and fasten themselves to the high branches. And the ponds appear like a black cloth on which are painted islands of summer lilies. If it is your nature to be happy,

you will swim away along the soft trails for hours, your imagination alighting everywhere. rails for hours, your imagination alighting everywhere. And if your spirit carries within it the thorn that is heavier than lead, if it's all you can do to keep on trudging, there is still somewhere deep within you a beast shouting that the earth is exactly what it wanted. that the earth is exactly what it wanted. Each pond with its blazing lilies is a prayer heard and answered lavishly every morning. Whether or not you have ever dared to be happy, whether or not you have ever dared to pray. All right, and our joke for this week goes like this.

It's a short one. The children were lined up in the cafeteria of a Catholic elementary school for lunch. At the head of the table was a large pile of apples. The nun had posted a note on the apple tray, Take only one. God is watching. Moving further along the lunch line, at the other end of the table was a large pile of chocolate chip cookies A child had written a note Take all you want

God is watching the apples Okay Now our song for the week This song is by a band called Alabama Shakes And it's called Hold On And it's one of those songs that I love

It's one of those songs that always picks me up, and I just love this singer. She's referencing herself when she says, you know, hold on, Britney. She's talking about herself, and I love the guitar lines in this one also. So I'll play you a little of it on our way out this week. Thank you for your support, contribution, generosity, and attention, and enjoy the song. Oh, my God. No Hey, you got to wait Hey, you got to wait But I don't want to wait I don't want to wait

I don't wanna wait So bless my heart Bless my mind I got so much to do I ain't got much time So must be someone Of a boy Say, come on, girl Yeah, you got to get back up

You got to hold on Yeah, you got to hold on And I don't know Yeah, it doesn't work I don't know Wait Well, I don't know Why Oh, I don't know Wait Well, one way No way

You've got to hold on You've got to hold on You've got gotta hold on. You gotta hold on.