There’s a phrase that millennials have been known to use — YOLO, an acronym for ‘You only live once’.
On the surface it’s just a fun phrase encouraging you to enjoy life, but there’s a danger if we take YOLO too seriously, because the YOLO mentality seems to imply that if it feels good, you should do it. It values ‘instant gratification’ over ‘patient satisfaction’.
We’re all trying to be happy at some level, and we can break down happiness into two buckets: short term pleasure and long term fulfillment.
Short term pleasure usually results in a brain chemical called ‘dopamine’, giving us a quick rush, and leaving us wanting more. We get short term pleasure from hitting a Juul, from getting a ‘like’ on social media, from biting into a Krispy Creme donut, from buying a new watch on Amazon. Short term pleasure is YOLO, and we certainly need some of that.
Long term fulfillment on the other hand comes from a relationship formed over many years, from building something of value in the world, from fighting for what we believe in, from embracing physical hardship, from working toward a meaningful goal. Like the patriot who is fighting for their country, or the parent who is caring for their child, long term fulfillment comes from going beyond immediate pleasures toward a greater purpose.
Oftentimes we seek pleasure just to fill the holes that are caused by a lack of fulfillment. Someone might feel lonely, isolated, or incomplete, and so try to drown out those feelings with drugs or virtual realities. But if achieving happiness were as simple as smoking a cigarette, devouring a pizza, or watching some raunchy porn, we’d be a happy bunch of evolved apes. Sadly this is not the case, and short term pleasure often comes in brief, elusive stints.
And although we should certainly enjoy our lives, take some risks and seize the day, what we’re really after is fulfillment, not pleasure. And fulfillment is not an easy target, because it’s very personal and it takes work and tough choices. It takes a fit mind to avoid falling down an instant gratification sinkhole. It takes grit and determination. It takes really knowing yourself.
Historically, we had a Darwinian struggle for survival. For millions of years, we banded together in tight knit tribes of hunter-gatherers and struggled together for our next meal. We didn’t worry so much about fulfillment because we got that from our tribes. We were happy just to live another day, and maybe if we were lucky, have some kids. But now in a modern world of abundance, the struggle for fulfillment and meaning has replaced the struggle for survival. We get our next meal at the grocery store, but where do we get our tribe from? Where do we get our sense of belonging? Where do we get our sense of purpose? For those things, we must cultivate patience and wisdom. Long term fulfillment results from an alignment between our values and our course of action.
Meditation is so key because it allows us to examine and even re-evaluate our values and life choices, recognizing what would bring us the most fulfillment, and then it trains our minds and gives us the strength to resist the instant gratification of the downstairs brain’s reward center when we must, to pursue more valuable, fulfilling choices. And at a deeper level, it gives us the superpower to find more fulfillment in the simple things, like the present moment. So by meditating, we train ourselves to become less driven by trivial, short term pleasures, and we choose to fight the hard inner battle that promises long term fulfillment.
If we accept YOLO to be true, then why not make that life a meaningful one.
