Suffering: The Series Part 8~The Now or Later Principle of Pain

Why do people become dependent on alcohol? What is the draw to substance abuse or dependency? How does a person come to the decision of sacrificing health, stability or other necessary securities for the sake of a momentary pleasure?

The simple answer is because pain is pain, and, as discussed before, humans are geared toward self repair, both physically and emotionally. Another reason is because pain is a singular event or experience in the midst of general lack of that experience, and it's singularity causes one to think momentarily rather than in a larger scale of perspective.

Put it this way. Imagine it is your job to weed out defective products on an assembly line. Simple enough, right? The assembly line moves, the products come through, you notice one with a scratch or a chip, you pick it up, you put it aside, and return to watching the line for more defects.

Generally speaking, assembly lines like this are paced at a speed that allows you to be thorough enough to catch the defects, get rid of them and then return to the rest of the products without missing any, so altogether, removing one won't have any major effect on the line in general.

But then let's imagine at some point you are asked to do the same thing, this time it's just you manning the line, and you've got your 5 year old son with you. The likelihood of you missing a defective product has increased because you are no longer able to give 100% of your focus to this assembly line, and therefore, your aim is going to be more specifically geared toward the defective products than it was before, because you have a job to do, and your productivity determines your ability to care for your 5 year old son.

In this situation, there are a couple of solutions. One would be to ask for more help. Now, it's not clear what kind of management you have in this situation, so maybe you could ask for it, but who knows if it will come or be granted to you. Another solution is to stop the assembly line after so many products come through to be sure you don't miss any. Theoretically, not a bad idea. Productivity may be lower than normal, but efficiency would stay up ultimately.

A third option would be to find ways to occupy your 5 year old son, whether by giving him something to focus on, or perhaps finding someone in another department willing to watch him while you work. The pressure is still on you to sort out the products by yourself, but you don't have the distraction of your son who will need attention at unpredictable times.

A final option would be to quit altogether, find a different job, work from home, whatever. The problem no longer exists if you are removed from the environment that created it, right?

Ultimately, the situation becomes a matter of accepting a suffering of some kind, but having to choose which kind based on what is more desired and what will produce a more meaningful outcome. What must I suffer now to reduce suffering later?

In each solution there is a temporary suffering leading to a relief of suffering in the future. Asking for help is a minor suffering of admitting defeat in a small way, leading to, if rewarded, a relief of pressure of accuracy. Stopping the assembly line, as mentioned, reduces productivity, but ultimately ensures accuracy.

Occupying your son or having a babysitter would create some uncertainty about his well-being, and could affect his attachment style, depending on how he accepts the care given by someone who isn't someone he is used to caring for him. However, that would reduce your distraction, ultimately increasing your efficiency and productivity.

And of course, quitting would present the challenge of finding a new job, which is a suffering in and of itself, but give the opportunity to work in a better environment which allows your life to develop as it should.

One way or another, suffering will happen, it's just a matter of how, and to what end.

To return to the questions asked in the beginning, those who choose alcohol, illegal substances, etc, as a regular coping mechanism tend to choose similarly to those choosing to stop the assembly line, but with the hopes of those choosing to leave the job for something else. The substance removes the momentary pressure, causing the assembly line to stop. If you're an individual lucky enough to not develop a substance addiction, you can return to the assembly line and continue to do your job once you've regained your focus and energy.

For those not so lucky, what happens is that the assembly line starts itself again, and instead of having the ability to return to it with new focus and energy, the individual either doesn't return, because he or she is of the mindset that it won't unless he or she is ready for it to, or returns but with significantly diminished ability to handle the pace and expectations of it having started again.

In other words, the choice made is avoiding suffering now, with hopes that it won't return in the future. As we've discussed, life simply doesn't allow that to work.

As a result, the reservoir of responsibilities grows deeper and deeper, and therefore so does the suffering the individual must either face and progress through, or continue to avoid. This is why we encounter individuals with serious addictions for multiple years as having a maturity relative to the age they were when their addiction began, as that is when they chose to stop the assembly line and not return to it.

So, the takeaway here is the not the fact that those with addictions have made some unrealistic choice in regards to accepting suffering now vs. later. What is important about this topic is to note that, they, just like every other human, have chosen to solve their problems, as most do, in a very singular, momentary way, due to the nature of pain and suffering as it is. What happens in addiction is not that the individual is addicted to something that is harming them, but rather they are addicted to the newly discovered feeling of not having to choose in general.

And, on their behalf, I can validate that it is an incredibly human conclusion to come to, and there is no shame in becoming addicted to that feeling, especially in these days and times.

Ultimately, the choice is universal, and what connects every person in the world, especially those who find themselves in my office confiding in me about their mental health, is that each human has and continuously makes that choice to suffer now or later, and each of us will encounter the reservoir whether we've made the right choice or not.

What makes the difference, significantly, is how we approach the idea of suffering, and how we regard it as either avoidable or unavoidable. Because truly, as long as we understand that it is unavoidable, we can change it from being a drop in a reservoir to an extra drop of force in a river funneling energy into our own growth and progress to self-fulfillment.