Impulse vs Desire — What it really means to work hard and enjoy life
How many times have you always wanted to do something but just never got to it? Plenty, I’m sure. In fact, there’s a semi-decent chance that’s what you’re doing this very moment by reading this article — to distract you from what you should be doing! But, have you ever wondered what it is really that makes you procrastinate? What does it really mean to work hard, but have fun? Can you enjoy a life when you spend a lot of time working? It turns out, you can. You just need to perform a switch in your mentality, and the way you see the situation at hand — living life and doing work.
Let’s start with an all-too-familiar experience — mindlessly scrolling on a cell phone.
How many times did you want to start doing a certain task, but were carried away scrolling through your phone? A lot, I assume. And most of the time, it isn’t something we like. We just do it. Let’s call this the impulse. These are things that our brain is hardwired to make us do, whether we like to or not. Desire, on the other hand, refers to what we want to be doing, rather than what we feel like doing — in this case the task you’re putting aside to scroll mindlessly on your phone. So, a simple solution to the issue would be to just keep doing work and ignoring what we feel like doing. The more time you spend working, the more you get done. But that sounds pretty harsh. Surely, that cannot be the only way!
Although a common thought, it’s not as simple as that. And it sounds harsh for a good reason: having that mentality will destroy you.
This is where I wish to discuss one of the most important concepts one must understand in order to beat the phone cycle and other similar cycles of procrastination, which also happens to be the title of this entry. Through my experiences, I have found that it is important to make a distinction every time you feel the need to perform a certain action — the distinction of impulse vs desire. Do you wish to perform an action because you feel an impulse to perform it, or is it due to a sincere desire to accomplish something? It’s a massive difference, as I have realized over time. Unfortunately, not a lot of people understand that. In fact, while trying to search for a photo to represent that distinction, I found an abundance of photos that showed impulse and desire as the same, and few that actually showed that these two things are very different.
To put that into perspective, let me tell you a story.
I once made the mistake of following that “simple solution”, and I had to learn the hard way that this mentality is toxic. As I stated before, I thought the key was to focus almost entirely on assigned work to the point that it became the sole reason for me to live. But, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get rid of the simple things — like watching YouTube or listening to music. The things that help me and grow myself as a person, but that aren’t really necessities. I fell into a trap of thinking that we only need to do what is necessary in life, and never cater to our so-called “luxuries”. However, I just couldn’t give up the things that allow me to relax and entertain myself, and I couldn’t just abandon my hobbies, no matter how badly my new way of thinking wanted me to. And in the end, it did nothing but add more unwanted stress into my life. I went and cycled through many analogies to help me understand the dilemma I was in better — the one of why I absolutely need to do things that are not related to my job, which was studying. I even went through an ultra-analysis phase where I questioned why I was so desperate to find a question to the question I had already asked about my dependence on external, non work-related activities. However, as I continued questioning myself, I began to pick up on a pattern. I really didn’t like questioning myself like this, and I knew it didn’t do much but make me more miserable. But, I did it since my brain kept going on with little regard to what I desired — build myself emotionally and socially and remain a focused person with a sane mind. The impulsive thinking I was facing did exactly the opposite of this.
Through this experience, I learned a valuable lesson on how to approach life.
Desire is merely a reflection of what we really need and want, and a representation of what we should be working towards building upon. Impulse is the one that tries to slow you down, by sucking you into useless habits and thoughts that are there for no reason but to distract you — as in the case of the useless self-questioning. It never did any use. My desire to watch YouTube and listen to music was there to help me grow as a person. This means only one thing — all along, I’d been ignoring the wrong thing! You are supposed to ignore things you do mindlessly, and never ignore how you feel. The latter is your friend, the former is your worst enemy. Don’t betray your friend, rather, show the enemy that it has no business interfering with you and your pursuit of happiness. It is very, very difficult to do this, but I will make an attempt to get better at doing that every day, and I encourage others to make a consistent attempt to do the same, no matter what situation you are in. In the end, our body, mind, and personality are all uniquely ours, and it is our duty to take pride in talking care and improving all those aspects!
Thank you for reading this entry!
-Vishal Janamanchi