Fulfilment through pleasures: where does the line end?

The root of all inner evil in our world stems from one simple fact; that we, as humans, are capable of great emotions and sometimes an excess or lack of certain emotions can lead us to be an unimaginable part of ourselves. In cases of self destruction, that has become the new trend in our world, we can assume that the mind games, the addictions, the desire to cause pain and experience it at the same time, these are all a direct result of the existential vacuum – that is, the void one feels in their soul when they feel they are living a life that has no purpose. The reason I mention this vacuum is because sometimes its effects are such that a person starts believing themselves to be cruel when in reality, their mind is simply so empty and ‘bored’ that it cannot help having irrational thoughts to fill the time. As the common knowledge goes, he who thinks bad is not cruel but he who does bad is. But once thoughts overtake a person, if in their mind they are slaughtered by the evil that haunts them, they will commit the crime they are only thinking about.

When we consider the reasons for such behaviour, we can be sure that once a sin has been committed, there is surely a mental twisted kind of pleasure that a human gains out of it, and that in their desperate and constant craving of such pain, that is actually pleasing to them, they will go to any lengths to experience more of it and will feel justified in doing so because of the numbness they feel in the current reality they are living in. In this way, humans craft a certain sort of escapism in their lives in unique and distinct ways that is often used to feel pleasure in a life that is drained of it or in a life that feels like it is not their own (this, I suppose, is because of the conformity that exists in societies).

Now if we ask about the true goal of our lives: Some will say money, others fame, some will have their lives planned out, some are only trying to get through the day. But here this question lies in the deep bottom of our heart, from which every thought and emotion in us arises, every action we commit, every feeling that consumes us, it all comes from this depth of the main question that we keep buried inside us, a depth that we keep away from in order to avoid falling into the abyss. But the abyss is this and if we do not fall in it, then we cannot live and everyday whatever we do is only another day we wait for death to come save us with its presence.

It has become a cruel world, with corruption and wars and politics and the hustle bustle of every working day, we have become slaves in the world. I don’t necessarily think this is a public problem but a problem of individual conscience on everyone’s part. As societies flourish in the modern era, people are more open to the idea of conforming to the ‘norm’ of their cities and their cultures and due to this, the natural potential that they are truly capable of is hidden within them and they are either too lazy or too scared to delve into it and pursue their own individual interests.

In the Greek Philosopher Aristotle’s science of happiness, he involves truly understanding our inner psyche; the things we wish for ourselves and for the world and having conversations with ourselves about our deepest thoughts as one important part to start truly feeling fulfilled with our lives. He gives a three fold theory concerning happiness, which he considers to be the central goal of our lives, and in this theory, he talks of happiness as not just pleasure but a mixture of pleasure, some internal and some external goods.  

So fulfilment through pleasures in our lives, where exactly does the line end? That’s easy: As animals, we are hardwired to pursue pleasure as much as we can, our desires actually make us hungry for it but there are pleasures that are more harmful than they are good and one must always know whether they are being wise and virtuous in the way they gain their pleasures and if they are wrong or being harmful in their pursuit of pleasure, then they must train themselves to experience punishment and pain for their vices.

Essentially, Aristotle’s viewpoint stresses that we must teach ourselves to experience pleasure while still abiding by our morals instead of being wild, desperate and uncontrollable in our path to it and if we do make mistakes or commit wrongdoings, then we must punish ourselves to truly train ourselves in the art of life or else, we will be just like animals in the jungle and there shall exist no wisdom and civility in the world and we will once again be drawn back to our desperate survival stage in the past centuries instead of the freedom we experience in countries now.