"Be grateful for what you have."
"Don't be entitled."
"Practice modesty."
"Do it anyway, but don't expect anything in return."
"Try to be friends with girls first, you need to see them as the wondERful human beings that they are."
Ever heard that shit before?
I have, many times.
All those platitudes are essentially about the concept of "gratitude".
The thing about gratitude is that it is simply unnatural.
Humans are hardwired to be "ungrateful" until our biological needs are met.
Humans, like all other living beings, are inherently selfish.
I understand that social or even altruistic behaviours exist, but those same behaviours also only exist for selfish reasons (i.e. "feeling good").
To add onto that, our whole reward system is built to require stimuli exceding previous stimuli in order to get the same endorphine hit.
You are an addict by nature, and acute withdrawel syndrome is an essential part of the human condition.
Now, to be perfectly clear, can you train yourself to be more grateful?
Yes, but only if your major needs are met.
Addicts, for example, can too train themself to be less addicted, but only if a half-way sufficient replacement for that same addiction is available.
A fentanly addict may slowly lower his dose, but he can't just go cold turkey.
Now, is that same addict ungrateful because he doesn't want to experience severe withdrawel syndrome?
Hell, no!
So how can you expect anyone else to be grateful, despite them not getting what they want and therefore suffering from acute withdrawel?
If a sufficient replacement for the object of their desire was already available, they would be "grateful" without you needing to tell them to be in the first place.
The most annoying thing about this "gratitude" gaslighting is that it is blatantly obvious why certain types of people do it.
The people that propagate that gratitude bullshit generally fall under those three categories:
1) Fortunate people that want to brainwash unfortunate people into accepting the miserable conditions those same fortunate people caused
(gaslighting/grifting with insidious intent)
2) People that, through sheer luck, are born into a great position, and therefore simply can't empathize with people on the lower strata of life
(confirmation bias/just world fallacy)
3) Naive people, who, in a desperate attempt to cling onto unjustified hope, fall for the lies of the first groups of people
(self-deception and other maladaptive coping strategies)
Of course one might argue that such lies are neccessary to uphold social order, and this is correct.
However, in our increasingly individualistic times the exposure to successful people has been on an all time high.
This exposure to successful individuals worsens the acute withdrawel we all experience.
It is simply impossible to remain grateful for your lot in life when you are exposed to Onlyfans whores and Twitch streamers making 10k an hour while you rot in intergenerational debt-slavery.
Where am i going with this?
"Just be grateful, bro!" is not a good incentive.
If our modern societies want their worker mules to keep trodding along, there need to give them enough sugar cubes.
There is no way around that.
There is no gratitude for your acute withdrawel syndrome.
Thanks for reading, wish you all the best.
"Don't be entitled."
"Practice modesty."
"Do it anyway, but don't expect anything in return."
"Try to be friends with girls first, you need to see them as the wondERful human beings that they are."
Ever heard that shit before?
I have, many times.
All those platitudes are essentially about the concept of "gratitude".
The thing about gratitude is that it is simply unnatural.
Humans are hardwired to be "ungrateful" until our biological needs are met.
Humans, like all other living beings, are inherently selfish.
I understand that social or even altruistic behaviours exist, but those same behaviours also only exist for selfish reasons (i.e. "feeling good").
To add onto that, our whole reward system is built to require stimuli exceding previous stimuli in order to get the same endorphine hit.
You are an addict by nature, and acute withdrawel syndrome is an essential part of the human condition.
Now, to be perfectly clear, can you train yourself to be more grateful?
Yes, but only if your major needs are met.
Addicts, for example, can too train themself to be less addicted, but only if a half-way sufficient replacement for that same addiction is available.
A fentanly addict may slowly lower his dose, but he can't just go cold turkey.
Now, is that same addict ungrateful because he doesn't want to experience severe withdrawel syndrome?
Hell, no!
So how can you expect anyone else to be grateful, despite them not getting what they want and therefore suffering from acute withdrawel?
If a sufficient replacement for the object of their desire was already available, they would be "grateful" without you needing to tell them to be in the first place.
The most annoying thing about this "gratitude" gaslighting is that it is blatantly obvious why certain types of people do it.
The people that propagate that gratitude bullshit generally fall under those three categories:
1) Fortunate people that want to brainwash unfortunate people into accepting the miserable conditions those same fortunate people caused
(gaslighting/grifting with insidious intent)
2) People that, through sheer luck, are born into a great position, and therefore simply can't empathize with people on the lower strata of life
(confirmation bias/just world fallacy)
3) Naive people, who, in a desperate attempt to cling onto unjustified hope, fall for the lies of the first groups of people
(self-deception and other maladaptive coping strategies)
Of course one might argue that such lies are neccessary to uphold social order, and this is correct.
However, in our increasingly individualistic times the exposure to successful people has been on an all time high.
This exposure to successful individuals worsens the acute withdrawel we all experience.
It is simply impossible to remain grateful for your lot in life when you are exposed to Onlyfans whores and Twitch streamers making 10k an hour while you rot in intergenerational debt-slavery.
Where am i going with this?
"Just be grateful, bro!" is not a good incentive.
If our modern societies want their worker mules to keep trodding along, there need to give them enough sugar cubes.
There is no way around that.
There is no gratitude for your acute withdrawel syndrome.
Thanks for reading, wish you all the best.
