"I'm Not Sated"

I was 28-years-old when Irish singer Sinead O'Connor released an album entitled I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got. That sentiment, only wanting what you already have, was a new idea for me, one that, in a small way, blew my mind. I'd already been married for four years, to the same wife I still have today. We had just purchased our first house, a tiny place with a sweep of lawn, a cherry tree, and a tidy pale blue paint job accented by a pink front door. For months, I walked around the place in a kind of blissful stupor, reminding myself, without quite believing it, "This is our kitchen," "This is our living room." I would lie down in the backyard grass, my hands behind my head, and say, "This is our patch of sky." Our parents were still alive and living nearby. Between us we could easily afford our lifestyle. We only had one car, but the house was right by a bus stop. When I heard that album title, I looked around and could honesty say, "I do not want what I haven't got."

Of course, it didn't last. It's human to need and want, unless you're going to dedicate your life to striving for a state of desirelessness -- which is paradoxically a quest driven by a desire for an unattainable state of perfect contentment. And perfect contentment just isn't in the cards.

As American actress Ashley Judd more accurately put it, "I can't think of anything I want and need that I don't already have, but at the same time, I'm not sated." This is why billionaires chase after another billion. It's why collectors keep adding to their collections. It's why hoarders keep hoarding. Being sated is, at best, a temporary condition.

Without needing and wanting, we wouldn't eat. We wouldn't care for our young. We wouldn't make new friends. Needing and wanting keeps us alive and thriving. At the same time, and the reason that O'Connor's sentiment has such appeal, is that too much needing and wanting is equally deadly.

We have come to call the times in which we live The Information Age, but it could more accurately be called The Age of Attention because when information is plentiful, attention becomes the scarce commodity. And one of the surest ways to secure attention is to target our tendency toward insatiability. We are drawn to information that offers us some sort of reward, be it knowledge, hope, security, or titillation. Video games draw players in with the promise of new levels, higher scores, and digital treasure that can only be spent within the game itself. Many of us spend hours a day scrolling, scrolling, scrolling our social media feeds, reading headlines that promise to satisfy some need or want, while discovering some we didn't previously know we had. And then, when we finally can't resist, we click one of those headlines. We're almost always disappointed. And even if we aren't, the satisfaction it brings us only lasts for seconds before we're back to wanting more.

As adults who work with young children, we know that they often need us to support them in not eating too much candy, if only because if they eat too much, they won't have an appetite for the healthier foods they must have in order to thrive and grow. 

The Age of Attention runs on molecules called dopamine. You're probably aware of them. You might have even used the expression "dopamine-fix" to describe behavior, your own or that of others, that seems addictive or destructive. Obsessive gamers, alcoholics, over-eaters . . . They are, we say, chasing a "dopamine high." The entire social media industry is based upon getting us hooked on the dopamine our own brains produce.

We often think of dopamine like a drug itself, but in reality, the way this molecule works is that our brains produce it in anticipation of sating our needs or wants. It is a forecaster of satisfaction. It spikes in those fractions of seconds just before we've clicked on that enticing link, then plunges the moment the page opens, which explains the disappointment. Dopamine is the molecule most closely associated with motivation. Without it, we simply wouldn't work as hard to secure basic food, clothing, and shelter. It is also the molecule at work when we plan for the future, whether it's mapping out our careers or simply fretting over tomorrow morning's meeting.

It's always tempting to talk about finding balance, but I've found that to be the kind of advice that is true but not particularly useful. I mean, easier said than done, right? Motivation is awesome when it's about, say, painting a masterpiece, but it sucks when it's about eating just one more piece of candy. The challenge is how to manage it so that we have room for the healthy food, and I think, at bottom, it's about learning to consciously manage our most precious resource: attention.

Having spent much of my adult life amongst children playing together, I've observed highly motivated humans in an environment that rarely included candy or screens, but was plentiful when it came to human beings, plants, rocks, sticks, sand, and water. Their minds pumped out dopamine from the time they arrived until their parents carried them out, often crying and complaining for "just one more minute!" For a long time, I thought that I was watching people who knew how to live in the moment, but I now know they were in a constant state of anticipation, forever curious, constantly asking, "What will happen if I do this?" or "What if I try that?"

I have nothing against candy or screens. I spend time every day on social media. But the more I've come to see my attention as precious, the more often I've chosen to go outside, to sit, to walk, or to simply be there to pay my attention to what the birds are doing or how the grass is growing. The more I do this, the more satisfied I find myself. At this moment, I'm anticipating getting this piece posted so I can pay attention to the ravens who are nesting in a tree outside my back door. 

The challenge isn't dopamine or candy or wanting what we haven't got. The challenge is remembering that our attention is the most valuable thing we have and to practice being conscious about how we use it.

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"I recommend these books to everyone concerned with children and the future of humanity." ~Peter Gray, Ph.D. If you want to see what Dr. Gray is talking about you can find Teacher Tom's First Book and Teacher Tom's Second Book right here. 

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