The Unearned Dopamine Epidemic: Instant Rewards Are Undermining Human Motivation
Originally a thread on X/Twitter:
A disturbing change to society over the past few decades is the number of people addicted to “unearned dopamine”.
Having spent countless hours with high stakes poker players and professional day-traders, I’ve seen the fallout. It can be ugly!
A few thoughts:
Let’s start with the basics.
Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that’s used by your nervous system to send messages between nerve cells.
Specifically, dopamine plays a role in how we feel pleasure which is why it’s known as the “feel-good neurotransmitter”.
Dopamine causes you to want and fuels your desires.
Dopamine motivates you to seek and act.
Dopamine creates reward-seeking loops in the pursuit of pleasure.
Dopamine is so powerful that it changes the brain on a cellular level.
And not all these changes are positive.
It’s Not Infinite
Dopamine is a limited resource and we can only release what we have in our systems.
Each of us has a baseline level of dopamine in circulation and any use of dopamine depletes our reserves.
Spikes Come With A Cost
Surges of excitement, anticipation or pleasure are accompanied by a significant release of dopamine which depletes a person’s dopamine resources.
Spikes in dopamine feel great but are followed by a crash which adversely impacts one’s mood and motivation.
It’s Unavoidable Because It’s Biological.
Life used to be brutal. Our ancestors spent their days searching out life’s basic needs (i.e. – food, water and shelter).
Dopamine crashes were a biological reminder that pleasure was temporary and laziness equated to death.
It’s Addictive
Any repeated exposure to pleasure-producing stimuli causes our brains to need more and more dopamine to feel “normal”.
Dopamine addiction is a real phenomenon and can lead to depression and anxiety.
The Source Of Dopamine Matters
The release of dopamine creates a reward circuit in the brain that equates specific experiences with pleasure and reinforces them via intense cravings.
Cheap sources of dopamine train your system to want more cheap sources of dopamine.
Sources of cheap dopamine are everywhere and typically “unearned”. Releasing dopamine with minimal effort is highly addictive.
Post on social media to chase “likes” — unearned dopamine.
Become an “angry keyboard warrior” and wait for retaliation — unearned dopamine.
Buy a meme coin or day trade stocks and watch the minute-to-minute fluctuation in price — unearned dopamine.
Make a daily habit of gambling, sports betting or playing high-intensity video games — unearned dopamine.
Sources of unearned dopamine are everywhere.
The problem is that earned dopamine requires training of our brains to derive pleasure from SUSTAINED EFFORT instead of from IMMEDIATE RESULTS.
Training for a marathon — earned dopamine.
Learning a difficult skill that requires practice — earned dopamine.
Becoming a patient, long-term focused investor — earned dopamine.
Taking on a personal daily habit like journaling or meditation — earned dopamine.
Dedicating time to a creative activity for yourself instead of for public consumption — earned dopamine.
Training yourself to “earn your dopamine” used to be easier to do but it’s become incredibly difficult in today’s society given how easy it is to find sources of unearned dopamine.
Unearned dopamine is the equivalent of empty calories. They make you fat and unhealthy.
So while “earning your dopamine” can be challenging, it can also be a transformational source of:
Increased grit and resilience
Sustained motivation
Improved focus on long-term goals
Lower levels of stress
Better relationships
And a general calmness under pressure.
So if you want to improve your chances of being “long term successful” and “long term happy” then it’s worth removing sources of unearned dopamine from your life and replacing them with sources of earned dopamine.
It’s not simple but it’s worth it.