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The problem is that we are hard wired to always want more. It requires constant reflection to short circuit this tendency.



> It requires constant reflection to short circuit this tendency.

http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/thanissaro/dhamma...

  Don't give way to heedlessness
         or to intimacy
         with sensual delight —
  for a heedful person,
  absorbed in [concentration],
  attains an abundance of ease.
  
  When the wise person drives out
         heedlessness
         with heedfulness,
  having climbed the high tower
  of discernment,
         sorrow-free,
  he observes the sorrowing crowd —
  as the enlightened man,
  having scaled
         a summit,
  the fools on the ground below.


Isn't there a valid distinction between the joy of making genuine progress in life and mere pleasure such as that derived from drugs or alcohol?


This is a question of virtue versus pleasure which is much explored by the Stoics because a contemporary, competing movement was Epicureanism, which extolled pleasure.

OP is referring, however, to the "life hack" promoted by the article's author which suggests keeping our baseline low so that we are constantly surprised to the upside.


The reflection itself becomes easier and more automatic with practice.




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