I’m a dopamine addict.
For most of my adult life, I’ve struggled with brain characteristics that I thought were a result of genetics, a personal lack of focus, drug use, or some combination.
I couldn’t maintain a sustained interest in any subject and progress long enough to become skilled at it. I would often have difficulty continuing a train of thought to a fruitful end. I was ‘absent-minded.’ I sometimes felt uneasy talking to people because my mind was racing and I wasn’t listening intently enough to produce a meaningful, genuine response and continue the conversation.
I guess you could call these symptoms of ‘ADHD’ — but I believed that was used way too often as a copout. I wasn’t always like this. I didn’t think it was a disorder that I had to deal with or take amphetamines to cure.
Then I came across the concept of dopamine addiction, and realized that years of detrimental behavior patterns were altering the makeup of my brain and its fundamental reward system.
These were the resources that shed light for me:
The TED talk is directly related to porn, but it was eye opening for me because porn is the most extreme manifestation of dopamine addiction.
Essentially, through evolution, our brains have learned to crave and seek information. New information about our environments, food, etc. in the hunter/gatherer days would give us an advantage for survival.
Today, we still have the same brain structure, but now we’re exposed to an infinite amount of information: 24 hours of news, articles, videos, texts, snapchats, etc. Our brains naturally want to consume and consume and consume. We feel compelled to ingest every piece of information. Each new piece of information gives us a rush of dopamine, as the hunter/gatherer brain is trying to reward this behavior that it thinks will assist with survival.
In regards to porn — a seemingly real sexual interaction is the biggest reward there is for a human, and comes along with a huge dopamine rush from the brain. The problem is, the ease of access of this by opening a new tab, switching to a new site, etc. has caused what the speaker (Gary Wilson) calls an ‘arousal addiction,’ which is often mistaken for symptoms of ADHD and similar mental disorders. You can reward yourself constantly at your own leisure, tricking your brain and short-circuiting the brain’s natural reward system.
This dopamine should be reserved as a reward for things we value most highly in a fulfilling life: progress towards short and long-term goals, positive social interactions, awareness of internal and external environments. Instead, it is constantly squandered away by checking irrelevant information in our pockets.
What‘s damaged in the process is the ability to delay gratification. Actively work, focus on each step, sustain interest, and a reward will manifest in the end. These little rushes of pleasure are distracting us from focusing on the big ones. Not completely in most cases, but to an extent certainly.
Of course, different people fall at different ends of the spectrum in terms of how deeply their neurochemical processes have been affected, and how deep their addiction is. After beginning to learn about all this, I examined my behaviors over the years: since the age of 13 (the prime of my brain’s developmental stage), I had developed compulsive habits of checking things on the internet that were completely irrelevant to my development as a human. Sports stories, scores, information about video games, social media, email, etc etc. I was 100% addicted to this information-seeking, instant gratification pattern, and it deeply affected by ability to practice delaying gratification; to learn valuable skills or cultivate interests. I was an extreme case due to 7+ years of detrimental behavior.
I noticed then how my brain had become an extension of the technologies I used. When I had an interesting thought, instead of digging deeper into it and using it as a spark for a creative output, I might directly post it as a Facebook status or Tweet. When I was taking in an awesome experience or surrounding, my brain was automatically thinking about turning it into an Instagram post.
It was taking the intrinsic value out of my direct conscious experience and pimping it out for external validation.
I had used to find true joy in experiences and relationships intrinsically, and I could feel it slightly fading, instead getting (fleeting) joy from these external factors. I’d find myself hyperactively checking to see the likes my picture had, forgetting that I ever even enjoyed the picture I took in the first place. This realization helped drive the behavioral changes I knew I needed to make. I needed to get back to loving life over likes.
When I would be waiting for something and felt the need to fill the space with entertainment from my device, I realized I was deteriorating the ability for my mind to be present with its thoughts and take in my surroundings. The less you engage your mind with this ability, the more it weakens. I was in a constant state of distraction.
In this state, you’re never really fully existing in any space. You’re not in the virtual world of the information you’re looking at on your screen, unconsciously consuming a neverending stream. And you’re definitely not present where you physically are. You’re just in between, floating around with diluted awareness.
My advice is to be honest with yourself about how important the connectivity is to your life. See what you gain from a life less involved with and reliant on your phone. Then decide if it’s worth it to you personally.
So what’s the solution? The following are things I implemented over the past two years to rewire my brain’s reward system. These have genuinely improved my willpower, awareness, brain’s functioning, relationships, intrinsic joy, thought patterns, and just generally feeling alive. Instead of receiving tiny rewards throughout the day, I now focus on the major tasks at hand, the small steps each day that accumulate force towards the ultimate goals that I’ve set out. Hopefully it can be of some help.
Turning Off Push Notifications for Texting
- I’d guess the average social person receives anywhere from 50–200 texts a day. I think of each one of these as someone interrupting me by giving me a little push while I’m in the middle of something. The compiled effect over the course of the day is huge. By turning push notifications off, you’re steering clear of these interruptions, and if you need to use your phone for something else, you’re not instantly distracted by messages that appear on the screen
- The strategy I’ve found to be most effective is to check my phone at set periods throughout the day. For example: 12 PM, 3 PM, 6 PM, 9 PM, and spend 5 minutes at each interval answering messages.
- I’ve recently adopted the policy of not checking texts until the end of the day (~10 PM). The nature of my work allows for this — if yours does too I’d recommend it. It’s awesome. If something is actually urgent, it shouldn’t be sent via a passive text message. Tell people to call you.
Turning Off Push Notifications for Social Media accounts
- See: above; every notification of a virtual social interaction coming directly to my phone (and mind’s) frontpage is unnecessary. I can choose to see them when I set aside time for it.
Not Checking Phone First Thing in AM
- When I previously was in the habit of checking my phone right upon waking, I was opening my brain up to the whole internet as its first input in the morning. A whirlwind of thoughts would ensue from all the things I saw. How could I possibly gather my thoughts and plan for the day?
- Try waiting until after you’ve gone through your morning routine, and finished the most important task you’ve set out to do for the day before checking your phone and opening up your attention to others. I can’t stress enough how much of an impact this has made.
Curbing Social Media Use
- This may be the hardest one to implement as using social media gives instant access of the illusion of satisfying basic needs of connectedness, belonging, validation. When used correctly, facebook and other platforms can be really useful for staying in touch with people. The problem is, usage quickly becomes compulsive, and can be a failed attempt to fill one of the voids in those basic needs. Those needs can be fulfilled by real human interaction or a more personal interaction with someone like a text, call, facetime, etc.
- Try checking your accounts 1–2 times a day (or less), and just spend 10 conscious minutes during that time connecting with friends
- I’d recommend hopping off of all social media for a month or two, just to be able to notice your habits and how your brain yearns for that rush, and how you can satisfy it by spending more real time with people. I went about 8 months without it to fully understand and let my brain repair its reward systems. Nothing important was missed, and I stayed in touch with all the people I wanted to (and better than ever, because personal contact was the only means to).
Curbing Idle Phone Checking
- Checking your phone compulsively is the biggest indicator of dopamine-seeking behavior.
- Get the app ‘Moment’ — it keeps track of how many minutes/day you spend on your phone, as well as how many times you check it. Set a number for both that you’re satisfied with and stick to it
Conscious use:
- This is the goal. To use the phone or computer when you need to and not getting instantly distracted when you do. When you reach for your phone or your computer, think about what you’re doing before you do it. If you can’t consciously think of a reason you’re checking, then restrain yourself.
I’ll leave you with this awesome excerpt from Brendan Burchard’s The Motivation Manifesto (highly recommend):
“The final clear indication that someone’s life agenda is not their own is constant lack of focus.
It is that terrible and never-ending distraction of the modern world that is stealing purpose and progress from our lives. It’s becoming a defining hour of humanity, where we either take back our attention or risk becoming emotionally addicted to our technology, to devices that somehow, though they have neither soul or intent, control us more than we control them. Humankind is fast becoming a slave to its own tools. Hours of the day seep away checking in, updating, and swiping, to what end?
It’s as if we are adrift in a digital stream we never consciously chose to wade into. And we are starting to drown. No sooner do we set out on a meaningful task than we feel compelled to look at something irrelevant. We barely make it through a single day without suffering browser blackout or app amnesia — those long gaps in the day when we are lost in a long chain of clicks and swipes that steal our momentum and leave no trace of real purpose or accomplishment.
Let us boldly ask what it says about ourselves if we cannot pull back from our addiction to digital distractions. For it is an addiction; we are no better off than the alcoholic who cannot avoid the bar or the gambler the casino.
Those with a compulsion to constantly check in have lives like this: They awake each day and their first act is to review the messages left by others, always terrified that they may have missed something that someone else wanted on a whim just hours or minutes ago. They reply with equal frenzy and devotion to one and all, to both influencers and idiots, their addiction to meet others’ demands making no distinction, giving no priority. All day, they are busy accomplishing nothing but responding to everything. There is no vision, only reaction — a self-imposed terror that they are falling behind.
Our defining moment will come as we either continue to slide into the oblivion of the deep digital stream, clicking and swiping and drowning in distraction, or take a higher vantage point apart from all the noise and, finally, after all this time, choose to refocus on what really matters in our lives.”
