How Socrates Beat Addictions
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- Опубліковано 23 лип 2023
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Yes, better judgement is definitely a way out of drug addiction. But what is missed by many people outside of an addiction is that joy is a live-saving positive and the drug brings fleeting joy to some. In people whose lives are immiserated by poverty, disease, emptiness, abandonment or whatever the cause--having some moments of joy, however ultimately destructive, can reasonably appear to be a life-saving act. Maybe for some it is. Maybe why the punitive approach to drug addiction isn't more successful.
Yes. While punishment is necessary, there is no repentance, atonement, redemption, without hope.
This is a great point, and to build on that idea, I don’t even think one must impoverished, homeless, etc etc to seek out those brief moments of destructive joy due to the lack of pure joy in their daily lives - for many, drugs wear them down to such a point where simply surviving while taking it is merely to stave off withdrawals (misery), hence thrusting someone with a fantastic life into precisely the same scenario as the impoverished person you mentioned - seeking temporary moments of joy due to how awful their circumstances have become. That’s what it was like for me at least - it made me so miserable, that for some reason rather than quit, I committed to contial usage for years just to feel that brief glimmer of happiness a few
Times a day
Sincerely, a man who’s only typing this out because I am currently enjoying that brief period of joy before I go into work. Will today be the day? Perhaps the fact I am even posing the question is evidence enough that, no, today will not be the day.
Are you sophist Brodie
Your videos are a breath of fresh air Lewis. Excellent work. Eloquently written. Well done.
Thank you!
You are one of the few people on UA-cam that make phenomenal videos which have profound value. I always learn something from your videos and the philosophers you mention. Also please do not be disheartened if some of your videos do not become “viral” or get a huge amount of views. That is what separates your channel from the others (and gives you class). As I see it, your video help millions of people learn about the thoughts of the great philosophers, in a visual format. Keep up the great work. :)
Cringe
Yeah I 100% agree
100% agreed
as a student of political science and of life i am indebted to you for your hard work for you have added significant value in my beliefs and way of comprehending. Love from India 🙏🏻
The way you started your sentence, I knew you were an Indian before reading your name.
@@amulyamishra5745 intuitions, aren't they something
That's lovely. I hope you're ALSO reading and viewing other things?
@@lowwastehighmelanin yes, infact I can't stop myself to. For I have realised that the day I stop learning I'll become a slave to some metanarrative which will at the end snatch the little bit of freedom I have left in this institutionalised world
Searching Socrates videos, the first I found were misinterpreted quotes forcibly mapped to modern-day scenarios.
And then I found yours. Socrates on matters of addiction - precisely what I was hoping to find - and posted only 2 days ago. It felt as if you had connected the three of us.
May you who is reading this keep to the path of a well-examined life.
The Buddhist concept of habit energy is by far the most effective way to deal with habitual behaviors that I have found. Meditation and mindfulness allow for more and more self-awareness. The greater our awareness (lack of ignorance), the more we will master our habits.
The same as cleaning the nous through mindful prayer in Eastern Christianity.
Thanks for this. Been Struggling with addiction for years and this has given me much needed perspective
It completely disregard the fact that addiction is a disease, when even the OMS has list it as one.
Don't give up just try and fill your heart with a purpose and hope. The more support and accountability (through friends and community) the more you can be close to heaven and the ideals we wanted when we were children. Were all just children in this harsh and beautiful world.
I was a drug addict and alcoholic for twenty years. When I didn’t drink I would end up in the hospital from withdrawals. Stopped six years ago and finally feel free. It’s a heavy burden to carry and in the end you will self destruct. I still am stuck on vaping though. That’s my next thing to stop but I honestly don’t see it happening for some time.
@EMan-cu5zo
Look up a product called "Füm" It might help.
funny how i came across this awesome video on addiction after having quit smoking at last! if only i had come across it before..!.the best way to quit is to know that the pleasure of smoking now is detrimental..addiction cravings have an urgency to them, and so we give in..it was a look into my future that helped me quit. this is the best video to help with understanding addiction.
You have made the world a better place for us lovers of knowledge and wisdom, it is impossible to show in words the gratitude I have for your incredible videos, I learn so much and get so much joy from them.
bro this is like the best ad for smoking. It's been a while I gotta grab a pack.
A. Carr's 'Easy Way' untangles some of this maddeness with addictions. Highly recommend to anyone who's serious about giving up. What's interesting is that the real liberating factor is Truth. Nothing else.
It amazes me how you're able to do such high-quality production videos this fast. These are excellent, thank you for your work.
There's a large paid agenda behind all of his videos. That's how he's able to have such high production value in overturn video so fast
Fantastic video, as always. On certain occasions, bad habits are a way to cope with the stress and anxieties of postmodern life. I know of that, so I engage in bad habits for minutes, hours, or a complete day. To return to an examined life based on knowledge, I use several techniques like good sleep, journaling, meditation, and Then&Now videos. :)
Contraries are necessary for human progression - William Blake
Found your channel few months ago , what a pleasure to be here , thank you so much !
As a lifelong vitality was drawn out via multiple addictions, the addict in oneself does indeed feel like I'm two people, or even more, as some make excuses, some are frequently maddening, and personal questions about worth and values. Especially when they are done in weakness, result in weakening, and I'd never thought about any of it pertaining to an human philosophy, Socrates, or a next step towards the self conscious and self care of the healing human. You've actually brought something useful to my innermost monologue. Well done, sir. I'm overwhelmed with pride to have seen my name on this excellent effort. ❤❤❤
What?
@@quetzalcoatlz I'm an addict. Not practicing. Socrates did indeed have insights on this (my) group. Bird Brain, lol jk. I'm no Socrates, and expressed my interests in this idea in a hurry. I wasn't on drugs when I wrote it, and sorry it didn't make sense to you. Didn't the great lord of the Aztecs enjoy his dabbling in narcotics and human sacrifice? But the name you carry even touches on this one topic...hope you have had a better explanation this time. Apologies.
I absolutely love your videos. Your style and analysis of these subjects is so helpful to me.
You've convinced me. I'm going to start smoking tomorrow, gradually work up to twenty a day.
Absolutely incredible videos, every time. We appreciate you, thank you!!
Lewis you provide such comfort with your wisdom synthesis of ideas. Thank you so much for this.
Loved this video. Becoming mindful of my own values and motivations has helped me to have power over my actions and live my life the way I truly want to live it. Thanks for this content!
Thank you so much! As always an incredible video!
Firstly, it's important to appeal to a value within yourself to motivate you or be the basis for discipline (because motivation WILL wax and wane)
What I've found for myself is that it helps for me to think of it in terms of "quitting one vice at a time."
For example, if I know I need to start working out, diet, quit drinking, smoking weed, and fix my sleep schedule, I'm not going to do all of that at once as it'll shock my system.
I'll start by going to the gym, watching what I eat, slowly cutting it down, while still indulging in whatever else gives me comfort until I'm used to a new normal with those. It's like a progressive series of training wheels.
At this point, I've quit drinking/drugs, lost 30 pounds, and put on a little bit of visible muscle. It's not about "wanting something more than you want your vice," it's about having a sense of duty to take care of yourself.
For me anyway. Whatever works for you.
Thank you, this was very helpful.
Clear, enlightening and soothing as always.
"hush! If you please: to my great delight I have escaped from it, and feel as if I had escaped from a frantic and savage master." - The response story Socrates relates when asked about love and was he still capable. The story was that of Sophocles - a friend of Socrates (I think it was in The Republic, not sure though).
Your ability to simplify historical facts deserve 💯👏
Really liked the animations in this one!
Very cool video. At the risk of oversimplifying, it sounds like the ending is basically a case for mindfulness. Not just the observing ones actions like a lot of people think, but also mindfulness of what is happening in your mind as you do those actions. Depending on what you observe, you may need a therapist to help you understand or be honest with yourself and fully gain that knowledge.
❤❤❤ Love this topic! Thank you.
The video hits hard , it was easy to understand, lively scenes and nostalgic. You should make another one on ' truth'
Excellent. Aristotle was like Hegel to these stoic ethical principles in his Nicomachean Ethics.
Got yourself a subscriber! Amazing video.
Brilliant as always!
you are probably my favorite channel, i would love it if you could keep your videos short like this one, or max 25 minutes
Another great video by another great human!
Great job, as usual.
Thanks for the video, the only thing is I cannot find the bibliograophy in the description, can you provide the exact dialogues of Plato used for the video?
Thanks for the great effort and the high-quality work. For the coming video, do you think that it is worthwhile to do one on Ludwig Wittgenstein or did I miss it?
Write on the cross at the head of my grave
For women and whiskey, here lies a poor slave
Take warnin' poor stranger, take warnin' dear friend
In wide clear letters this tale of my end ☠
I couldn't get this out of my head, and I couldn't help but compliment you and compare it to my pops, who said "in death, as in life, with my mother, sister, and wife." Had to share, glad you did too.😊❤
@@laurenjeangreenbean6301 Did your pops know about the Mary Anning and Hypatia tragedy?
@@CrackleCat he was a 33rd degree freemason, although he died when I was young. Seemed like knowing things must
to have been his bag, but I have not heard of it...share?
@@laurenjeangreenbean6301 Hypatia was a Greek polymath/Philosopher murdered by the patriarchy. "Agora" as a cinematic summary of her life is a worthy contender.
"Mary Anning" was a pioneer of palaeontology when women weren't allowed to be educated then either. Ammonite?
@@CrackleCat I had thought I'd heard Hypatia before, but mostly in terms of what an extraordinary time for a woman, no Les an extraordinary woman in her element and enhanced her time...Greek women are frequently unmentionable in discussion of accomplishment. Wasn't her father a famously talented academic as well?
Really enjoyed this video! Great work!
I'm dying to know how one procures a ball and chain in this day and age 😂
Marriage. Zing
Nicely done man.
wow, amazing video! thank you.
so basically, instead of thinking “should I quit or not quit smoking?“, we should rather think “how much or little must I smoke to end up with the least negative effects in my life.”, we must measure how to outway the pros and cons in a moderate and ‘healthy’ way
Thank you!
If you look at 'Addiction' holistically, there is the 'Mind-Body' match at play too. Instead of 'pleasure', maybe it's 'a relief' that we are experiencing from that Mind-Body match. Trauma, Negligence and Abuse put us in a heighten state, so introducing amphetamines to a survivor, probably brings a Mind-Body match, which brings an overall sense of relief. The world is complex, disorienting especially to those suppressed, add alcohol and it's disorienting qualities. Mind-Body match. Relief
An impulse to do something must be countered by an equal or greater impulse to do something else. Almost like one of newtowns laws of physics. I like this. It makes me reflect on my motivators and my goals. Can I achieve my goals by managing impulses that go against them this way, say for example, by thinking of what would be the greater motivator for me - a short term or long term consequence, one or the other consequence. Thanks for the video, inspiring new and confirming old ideas
Thanks!
The etymology of “addiction” is interesting to me. I’ve heard that it goes back to ancient Greek “adio,” meaning something like “religious devotion” in modern English.
When we make a choice to continue a bad habit despite having the knowledge that it is a poor trade off, we do that because the need feels too much like an emergency to pay any attention to anything else.
0:16: 🔑 The video discusses the duality of the soul and the struggle between rationality and desire.
3:08: 🚭 The speaker reflects on the unappealing aspects of smoking and the difficulty in understanding its appeal.
5:56: 🤔 Socrates believed that acting out of lust and pleasure is a result of ignorance.
9:04: 🧠 Knowledge is a powerful force that cannot be overcome and should guide our actions.
11:56: 🧠 The key to making good choices is knowledge and wisdom, which can be achieved through self-examination.
Recap by Tammy AI
again a thoughtfully made video
Great video (like all of yours), thank you for that!
Just have a question, as while I understand the reasoning behind, from my experience this is in the 'sounds good, doesn't work' area for most people (me included).
I'm really curious how you see it, but if, for example, after this video you're still smoking, do you see this as a sign of 'sounds good, doesn't work, is more complex than that' or ' I just didn't understood yet fully all the repercursions and that's why I still smoke. When I'll get to the correct level of knowledge I'll stop'? I'm not saying this is not correct nor that it doesn't work for some/many people; what I'm saying is that when it comes to this it's more complex than that and also, I'm really concerned (mainly in today's life due to the propaganda that you see everywhere) that many people will understand and turn this on the other way around: if you're still smoking is your fault; if you're fat is your fault etc.
Hence my question: if you see this video and you still smoke/have bad habits, is that because you didn't gathered enough knowledge, or even with all the knowledge we still proceed in our bad habits.
Who elses fault would it be if someone is still smoking? This is just one way to think about it and it may or may not resnonate. But it's generally how I thought about quitting. Every time I used nicotine, just ask yourself if this decision aligns with your goals and wants out of your life. And for me it doesn't, it's a habit that actively goes me away from the long, wealthy, fulfilling life I want. I'll still smoke once or twice a year with friends.
I am wondering, because sometimes when im learning something, i have a felling, that im not really doing the learning. But i just stare at some papers at some documents read them, i just throw time at them. And the next day I'm more knowledgeable about them. But i dont know how, mainly because i can suddenly understand things, that i couldnt just memorize.
Maybe the addictions are something akin to this learning, that i dont do. But not entirely because its natural to our body to wallow in its addictions and magicly we are preventing it to do so. Maybe we are just the invisible companion to our own body, that drives us to do things, that it wouldnt be capable doing otherwise. Like for example not smoking, not drinking etc.
But that would be just "driven by two horses" with extra steps wouldnt it?
I"m for the examined life, but 'I is another,' and self-examination, especially when it comes to beating bad habits, seems to me to require some technique for seeing past our tricks for hiding from ourselves.
The alternative to my vice is sobbing in pain. I know it's wrong, but so is the alternative to it. The only thing that would solve it is what Schopenhauer said is best.
Sometimes it is good for the soul to weep in regretful sorrow and tearful repentance.
ua-cam.com/video/JHBLIHYsZYE/v-deo.html
Have mercy upon me, O God,
According to Your lovingkindness;
According to the multitude of Your tender mercies,
Blot out my transgressions.
2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,
And cleanse me from my sin.
3 For I acknowledge my transgressions,
And my sin is always before me.
4 Against You, You only, have I sinned,
And done this evil in Your sight-
That You may be found just [a]when You speak,
And blameless when You judge.
5 Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,
And in sin my mother conceived me.
6 Behold, You desire truth in the inward parts,
And in the hidden part You will make me to know wisdom.
7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
8 Make me hear joy and gladness,
That the bones You have broken may rejoice.
9 Hide Your face from my sins,
And blot out all my iniquities.
10 Create in me a clean heart, O God,
And renew a steadfast spirit within me.
11 Do not cast me away from Your presence,
And do not take Your Holy Spirit from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of Your salvation,
And uphold me by Your generous Spirit.
13 Then I will teach transgressors Your ways,
And sinners shall be converted to You.
14 Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God,
The God of my salvation,
And my tongue shall sing aloud of Your righteousness.
15 O Lord, open my lips,
And my mouth shall show forth Your praise.
16 For You do not desire sacrifice, or else I would give it;
You do not delight in burnt offering.
17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit,
A broken and a contrite heart-
These, O God, You will not despise.
18 Do good in Your good pleasure to Zion;
Build the walls of Jerusalem.
19 Then You shall be pleased with the sacrifices of righteousness,
With burnt offering and whole burnt offering;
Then they shall offer bulls on Your altar.
Socrates sorted it out this way based on his best knowledge of human mind. I think that today we know more about the internal conflicted nature of our brain, so we can explain addictions better. The behaviours we fight are not necessarily coming from lack of correct knowledge, but simply from not respecting the fact that brain is a _layered_ structure. Its deeper components are the source of our "animal urges" and "reflexive behaviours" that we can, but don't have to, override. By overriding them, our power to do so becomes stronger, but by indulging them, we become more and more powerless to change them. That's why I think the tendency to indulge, that is used so effectively to sell products, is dangerous. People think that nothing bad can come out from having life's little pleasures, and up to a point, it's true. But when a behaviour becomes an addiction, then we came to a point where the urge has become stronger than our ability to override it. Then our task becomes to, little by little, build up those neural circuits that allow us to choose rational action instead of a series of reflexes, and it's a much tougher task.
This video was produced as a result of a mastery over the lesser impulses and with the right knowledge of the good that it could do.
Why I can’t find this on Apple Podcast?
Dude Socrates is just top notch 👌
Going to take this as another occasion to encourage you to read, and perhaps make a video on, pragmatism, specifically Dewey's. On the subject of habits, for example, his 1922 book Human Nature & Conduct is something I believe you would get a lot out of, given how it approaches the question from not only psychological and evolutionary/biological points of view, but also social and historical ones.
Ethics is necessarily pragmatic, but pragmatisism assumes the conclusion as it's premise so it is fundamentally circular on a meta-ethical level. It's good > because its useful >because it's good >because it useful >because it's good.
@@user-iz8wx1qb4p This is a particular common reading of James' pragmatism. It's a little inaccurate regarding James and simply doesn't apply to Dewey at all. In fact, we can cite the latter on the former: "Some of the critics (especially continental) of [James] would have saved themselves some futile beating of the air, if they had reacted to James's statements instead of to their own associations with the word "pragmatic."" Dewey (1916)
amazing!❤
Yes, indeed, very good.
Really like this video. Short and to the point while being quite poignant. Appreciated!
Would love a documentary on Hegel.
4:44 what painting is that
The horses metaphor is much better than the one with two wolves inside you.
Cheers! :-)
So to sum this up; How many more years will you waste to bad habits and addictions Before finally saying I will instead of I should?
Till I die.
Was this video recorded in Spain?
4:27 Should and shouldn't? Why jump to an end judgement, especially when it might not ever come around anyway? How am I understanding this I'm engaging with anyway? Not as a mechanistic explanation, but as a hermeneutics of my own life.
Why all the focus on the moment of a decision, especially when the greatest of our talents can show up in the ways we can reflect, represent and communicate each other about what we're engaged with in the first place
Open a addiction treatment center! The repeat clientele will make you rich!
We've learned Socrates a lot in school. He's one of the more well-known philosophers from ancient times. Indeed his worldviews differ from that of an ordinary person.
Wonderful
How can you beat junk food? I already did and the results are mind-blowing. It's a revolution of the mind 😅
Ahhh, yes...focus on the "why".
In what text does Soccs say that?
Thanks , i knew that u r talking about me
In my opinion, we do have “two selves.” One is your adult. And one is your child. You need both to be healthy. But they need to work together
I smoked o-rings all throughout this video.
Music ... Please...
astonishing Socates hit on measuring consequences.
The more I know the more I don't know thus absolute knowledge is unattainable thus can't guarantee good choices ....yesterday I was choosing coke zero based on knowledge today I knew full sugar coke was a better choice as not as cancerous...life has to be lived forward but "understood" backwards as Kirkegaard said 😅
Inside you there are two horses.
Where is the bibliography?
The idea that emotional intuition is separate from rationality really does not gell well with conceptual analysis or reflective equilibrium. "Bringing into proportion" sounds very much like "bringing intuitions into equilibrium".
Henlock is good for breaking good habits, too
Litterbug. 😆
Cigarettes are for me- a pure textbook example of addiction/habit. There are more moments I detest the experience than enjoy. But the routine, the throwing out a treat up ahead is what locks me into the groove. It’s an insidious contract or game I play with myself in my subtler mind. Last one this time eh b? A collage of characters play through my mind, a film reel of cool smoker images spiral. Then the sadness of making myself unwell and the effect it would have on those I hold dear should I die by my own tar stained hand. I mean it’s just a fag right? And yet on some level it’s a full existential battle waging on and a ticking clock.
It’s such a fight at times to let myself go and just say f it is a sickly sweet reward for such self torture. And round and round I go.
It’s just killing me slowly
But then life is just that anyway.
Ακρατια or Akratia btw @then&now
Yea and you know when people cheat I think they underestimate how much harm infidelity can cause thereafter. You rationalise that its just sex, one time. And if the partner never knows then its all good. But thing about secrets is that they come out eventually. And the damage become evident e.g. distrust, divorce, children in the middle, etc - all this, just to bust a nut
Legendary
Non-smokers are guilty of the pension crisis🤬
The monkey mind is arduous to subdue
👌
Nice video, you should have put a cigar in your mouth in the scene where you walk in tall grass :) [around 7min in]
Please read this. At the Symposium is being said that Sócrates could drink all night like a savage. I don't understand how people can get trapped with this "Mr. Wonderful" type of advice
AA Meetings..?!
Youve made a lot of viseos about addiction. Something ur trying to tell us buddy? Its cool. Im addicted to ur videos ao i know those feels.
Oh abd amphetamines. Im acutely addicted to them.
The video is great, but I found the subtitles a bit confusing and inconsistent with what I was hearing. It's as if they are AI generated or something.
Sean Strickland won, but the bookies made lots of money saying he didn't