Doing Something Special to "Have Fun"

 

Last New Year’s Eve there was a story in the news that received quite a bit of attention for a few days.  The news story was about a devastating fire that occurred at a bar in Switzerland which resulted in 41 deaths and 116 people injured. The fire was reportedly ignited by sparklers attached to champagne bottles, which ignited soundproof foam in the bar's ceiling. A group of young people had gathered there to celebrate the beginning of a new calendar year.

The story told about a young man who left the celebration party early because it was “too quiet” for a celebration, but came back later and helped a number of revelers escape the flames in the basement bar.  He left because apparently being with a hundred or more people crammed together in a basement bar, loud music, drinking, dancing, and, billiards just wasn’t exciting enough for him.  He needed something that wasn’t so quiet.  The question that arose for me was: “When is it enough” to provide enough sizzle?  Apparently, the other people in the bar didn’t think it was enough either because after the young man left, they lit sparklers inside the basement bar that caused the fatal fire.

And is there anything really worth celebrating about January 1 as “the start of the new year?”  It’s a completely arbitrary date—it could start on the winter solstice (December 20-22 depending on the year) the summer solstice, the spring equinox, or the fall equinox.  These are at least real events but which one of them you pick is arbitrary and you could just as easily pick some other arbitrary date.  In addition, what is there to actually celebrate?  It’s not at all like celebrating an actual accomplishment, such as graduating from college, having a baby, getting a job, or getting rid of a dishonest politician.  So the celebration is just an excuse to get drunk, become overstimulated, and escape from your real life for a few hours.  It seems to me that there is a certain sense of desperation about all this.

Although not as highly publicized as the events in Switzerland, this behavior is not unusual.  At the university near where I live, there is a weekly event called “thirsty Thursday” where students have arranged their schedules so they have no classes on Friday—and therefore can go out drinking with friends and be hung over on Friday when they have no classes.  For some, Thursday night is the beginning of a four-day drinking binge.  The revelry of Spring Break is the same thing on a grander one-to-two-week scale.  Students say they need to “get away” from their lives as students and “blow off steam” from all the pressure of forcing themselves to do something that is really irksome to them and lacking in meaning for them—something they have to do.  Would they feel the need to do this if they found their years in college to be satisfying and meaningful?

So what’s going on with people who behave this way?  The answer that arose in me was that apparently people need to have a steady stream of over-the-top experiences because the rest of their “regular” life makes them feel dead, bored, numbed out, and empty inside. 

This was never more clearly on display than the time I had a student in class during the Iraq war who told me that he was about to volunteer for a second tour of duty and combat.  I asked him why he would want to do something so dangerous.  He said combat was the only place he felt completely alive.  Everything after he came back from his first tour was boring, deadening, and unsatisfying.  Clearly, he wanted a high degree of stimulation and wanted someone else to provide it.  And look at the lengths this person went to in order to “feel alive.”  He would be subjecting himself to the almost constant possibility of death or life altering massive injuries in order to medicate his boredom with his “regular life.”

When people are operating from this mental/emotional place in life, there is the constant need for a “bigger roller coaster” to feel ok by distracting themselves from the emptiness and boredom they feel--and avoid having to stare into the terrifying abyss of “Where is there anything of meaning in my life?” and “Is this all there is?”  And if they can’t find a big enough roller coaster to keep the abyss at bay, they can fall back on keeping themselves constantly busy with small activities—and it doesn’t matter much what those activities are.

But someone might say “What’s the harm?  People enjoy this stuff and it takes their mind off their problems.”  But harm is caused. The harm occurs when we use distracting activities as a drug to keep us unaware of what is going on in our lives.  There is nothing wrong with listening to the radio while driving your car, unless it is done to drown out that peculiar sound coming from the engine that is trying to tell you that there is something wrong that needs fixing.

There are a number of ways that habitually using distracting activities harms us.  First, chronically distracting myself prevents me from ever learning how to simply be with my feelings and my experiences and make peace with them.  I will, for example, always be uncomfortable with and afraid of my anger until I learn to open to it and just feel it, explore it, and finally make peace with it—instead of  constantly trying to avoid it.

                Second, avoiding my experience prevents me from seeing clearly what is underneath my uncomfortable feelings.  I am prevented from seeing, and then working through, whatever life issues lie underneath my fear, anxiety, agitation, emptiness, or confusion.  When I am depressed, there is likely a reason for it—perhaps my job is tedious and without meaning, or I have no friends, or I regularly am judging myself harshly.  Until I get in touch with this and learn to work with it, the best I can hope for is a little superficial management of my symptoms—but never address the actual causes.  Emotions like fear, anxiety, anger, and depression are like messengers who knock at our door with information about what is going on inside ourselves and in our lives.  If every time they come we slam the door in their faces, we never receive those valuable messages and never see how to change things for the better. 

                When we are not in touch with our own experience and life-issues, we are likely to find ourselves agreeing with or accepting what is considered a “normal” life as defined by our society or acquaintances.  This is often a life of tedious and unfulfilling work that beats us up physically and psychologically.  It is a life of shallow and unsatisfying or even toxic personal relationships.  It is a life of hopelessness, resignation, and “settling” for things that are empty of any real meaning. And of course, the worse we feel, the less we want to know about what is going on or what we truly feel, and the more we crave something to take the edge off. 

                The key question to ask ourselves here is: “When I find myself reaching for something to push down my distress, what is it that I am afraid to feel, experience, or be aware of in this moment?”  The answer to this question puts us in touch with our deepest personal issues.  This is the crucial first step toward profoundly changing ourselves and breaking old dysfunctional patterns

                Third and lastly, when we are constantly distracting ourselves with activities or food or drugs, our habit of avoidance means we never learn to do things that are difficult, scary, painful, sad, or unpleasant.  And yet, doing these kinds of things can be among the most meaningful, satisfying, beautiful, rich, and beneficial things we do in our lives.  In order for this to happen, we must not allow our discomfort to stop us.  I will always cherish the last three weeks of my mother’s life that I spent caring for her as she went through the dying process.  It was a beautiful experience from which I learned life-altering lessons.  But it was also scary, sad, and physically exhausting.  Had I avoided being fully present for this time, I would have missed something special, and my mother would have missed something as well.

                Fears of the future, not knowing what we want…, these “excursions” into overstimulation become our drug of choice.  The very first, and very large, step toward positive change is for us to really see what we are doing and what it costs us in engaging life in this way.  It becomes much easier for us to change when we finally see clearly the cost to us in time, money, energy, and quality of life.

Once I begin to see what is going on in my life, the process of change is already well underway.  My work at this point then becomes a journey of inner exploration and finding what really energizes me because it connects with my heart.  This not unlike the ancient Native American practice of going alone into the wilderness on a vision quest to find out who I am and what really matters to me.

 

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Website:  https://www.ahimsaacres.org/

Substack: https://dalelugenbehl.substack.com/

 

 

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