A Poignant Example

When I was a kid in Charleston, Missouri, I wrote plays for my classmates to perform. I had accommodating teachers who allowed it and I remember doing several of these in grade school. Once I wrote a play for the kids' TV show "Zoom", sent it off, and forgot all about it, though I hoped they would pick my play (they solicited such things from children) and put it on.

(CONTINUED BELOW)

A few weeks later, I received a letter from WGBH in Boston. They had chosen my play! My always-encouraging dad called his old friend, Art Wallhausen, who was the editor of the local weekly newspaper--and the next week, there I was on the front page.

Here's the dopamine and H&N connection. I wrote the play to get it on TV in the future, but I wrote it just as much to have putting it together in the here and now. How do I know? In the article, the little summary I give of the play is not even close to what it was about. The title is wrong, too! I had fun in the moment, which was enough for me at the time, sent it off in hopes of seeing it on TV, and then I moved on to the next thing.

This is a great example of an excellent balance of consummatory H&N pleasure and anticipatory dopamine stimulation. I knew none of that at the time, of course. (Neuroscientists didn't quite know it yet, either.) I was just enjoying life. Lately I'm deciding that kids are good at this. Adults have to work at it but when you're young, very young, I think it comes naturally. I tend to believe we're messing that up with social media and cellphone access.