January 17. First, a loose end from the last post. Josh mentions that wild animals seem to have an internal conflict when they want to get food or water but they're afraid of predators. My first thought was, that's different from humans who feel like playing video games when they should be exercising. But now I'm thinking, what if it's the same? Choosing the water, and risking being eaten, is like choosing the game, and risking death from heart disease.
One difference is, indecisive animals are torn between two feelings, while humans are smart enough to mentally understand dangers and opportunities that we don't feel, so we're torn between feelings and thoughts. And that leads me to a speculative definition of neuroticism: the distress that arises when we realize that our feelings are not reliable guides for our actions. So as our world gets more complex and alien, our feelings become less reliable, and neuroticism increases.
Related: What's Causing the Rise of Hoarding Disorder? I've been hearing a lot lately about Marie Kondo, a decluttering guru with a show on Netflix. Her big idea is sparking joy. You look at your possessions and ask if this or that sparks joy, and the more you do it, the more skilled you get at sensing your own positive feelings and acting on them.
My thought on hoarding, and the cure for hoarding, is that it's about animism. Quoting my December 5 post:
Our nature-based ancestors were animist, because almost everything in their world was self-organizing, and could be realistically viewed as a person. Even a tool would be made by the person using the tool, or by someone they knew, so it would already be integrated into the world of people and stories.
Now manufacturing has surrounded us with mass-produced objects, and we don't have a clear sense of how to assign meaning to all these things. From the article:
Rather than see an object as a member of a large group (say, one of 42 black T-shirts), [hoarders] see it as singular, unique, special. Each black T-shirt is perceived apart from the others and carries its own history, significance, and worth.
The genius of Marie Kondo is not fighting animism, but embracing it: Go ahead and think of all your objects as people, and then politely send away the ones that aren't making you happy.
]]>