The speaker discusses the role of dopamine in motivation and pleasure. Dopamine is often associated with reward, but it's more about motivation and craving. The brain uses dopamine to track progress and tabulate successes and failures. When we achieve a goal, dopamine release creates a feeling of pleasure, but it's the pursuit that's actually the reward. Celebrating the win too much can lead to a crash, making it harder to experience motivation and craving again.
The speaker suggests that people should learn to adjust their celebration and not let themselves get too manic, allowing their system to reset. This means taking time to relax and not spiking dopamine again immediately after a win. By doing so, people can maintain their capacity to tap into dopamine as a motivator and achieve repeated successes.
The key is to see seeking as the reward, not just the finish line. This mindset allows people to stay motivated and continue pursuing their goals without getting stuck in the pain side of the dopamine scale.
Here are the key facts extracted from the text:
1. Dopamine is a molecule associated with reward, motivation, and craving.
2. Dopamine release in the brain makes us pursue things, build things, create things, and want new things.
3. Dopamine helps us gauge our progress in life, whether we're doing well or poorly, on short and long time scales.
4. Understanding how dopamine is released and how it changes our perspective and behavior can help us work with it.
5. Dopaminergic drugs, such as cocaine and amphetamine, trigger excessive dopamine release, leading to addiction.
6. Opioid-like effects can occur from constantly indulging in social media, video games, or food, leading to a loss of motivation and craving.
7. Dopamine is not the reward itself, but rather the build-up to the reward.
8. The reward has a kind of opioid bliss-like property, which can be problematic if it's not endogenously released.
9. Celebrating a win more than the pursuit can lead to failure in the future.
10. Dopamine reward prediction error occurs when the expected reward is not met, leading to a lower dopamine baseline.
11. Epinephrine (adrenaline) is closely related to dopamine and is manufactured from the molecule dopamine.
12. Craving and motivation are closely linked to dopamine and epinephrine.
13. Adjusting one's celebration internally can help prevent a crash in dopamine levels after a win.
14. Allowing the scale to reset after a win can help prevent a crash in dopamine levels.
15. The capacity to tap into dopamine as a motivator is infinite, and seeking is the reward, not just the finish line.