08/10/2022
Comfort and the accumulation of material possessions are guided by desires as old as the world.
It must be realized that a human being is above all an animal that has lived the millions of years that its evolution has lasted in a difficult environment, to which it has had to adapt. None of his behaviors are "useless" in the environment he has to face. On the contrary, these are the same behaviors that have ensured its survival: seeking a bit of warmth when the elements are unleashed, rediscovering the sweet sensation of the sugar of a fruit in a context of almost permanent scarcity, keeping a precious tool or ostentatious objects that prove his status, therefore his value among his peers—an essential condition for his social acceptance, and therefore for the transmission of his genetic heritage.
Nature did not forge man to be happy or to find meaning in his life, questions that matter so much to us today, now that technical progress offers us (and this in a totally unprecedented way in history of Humanity) this increase in abundance and comfort.
Nature gave man an insatiable appetite for sugar, for example, in an environment where it was limited. She "didn't care" what would happen if he could all of a sudden consume it at will and effortlessly, and the body is clearly not used to dealing with this surplus. Only the appetite remains, never entirely satisfied, because it is a simple, instinctive rule.
It's the same for everyday comfort: Man wallows in comfort at all costs, because he is made for that. Avoiding pain, cold, effort, are imperatives in a world where these ailments are inevitable most of the time. The body “expects” to be strained, but it does not want it. This is why, while it is a good thing to play sports (to simulate the efforts that we had to make in our time as hunter-gatherers), it is often difficult to stick to it, because we only aspire to escape physical discomfort.
This is also the danger of our modern societies: we have the freedom to do almost what we want, but what we want is not necessarily what makes us happy. Some realize it, because Man being endowed with an intellect which allows him to reflect on his past and to project himself into the future, he can partially escape his instinctive conditioning, if he so decides. It is because he is able to delay his immediate gratification that he has been able to achieve great things, such as working on difficult projects and building complex systems whose benefit is not immediately noticeable. This is one of the main differences between humans and animals.
Nevertheless, it is not always easy (nor useful) to systematically go against our primary desires. Sometimes, having fun is essential to our balance, and we let go: we compulsively buy goods that are not objectively useful to us, succumb to a delicious pastry, we take refuge under a duvet to watch television while eating crisps , spend more time than we'd admit gossip-chasing on social media or spend crazy amounts of money on designer clothes.
The most important thing then is not to deprive ourselves for no reason, but rather to realize that the frantic search for “useless” things will not make us happier in the long term.
Comfort
