Dopamine is a key substance / Neuromodulator) — on motivation, desire, and fulfillment levels overall.
One key aspect that is often neglected by mentioning “dopamine hits” is the contrast of dopamine with relative activities.
Example, if from waking up, you grab a textbook on science, it may be really interesting to you, because the baseline to contrast was sleeping.
If on the other hand on social media you saw something you really liked, that’s a big dopamine hit, following that you grab your science textbook, it will seem not very interesting, even though is the same as the first example/ why ? Baseline, contrast
After the spike of dopamine from a social media post, the dopaminergic contrast response with science textbook is noted.
This has massive implications.
This is why when you repeatedly do something you enjoy, the threshold to enjoy it start to go up and up and up.
Activities that spike dopamine and its increases :
- Chocolate: 1.5x
- Sex or the pursuit of it: 2x
- Nicotine: 2.5x
- Amphetamine: 10x
- Exercise: 2x (Varies depending on enjoying the activity. it can be 0x)
Caffeine: Modulator, makes dopamine receptivity better.
Studying, Hard work, Effort, are subjective, so dopamine increase by magnitudes x’s cant be generally measured.
Cold plunge : 2.5x / Dopamine increase in sustained manner
Key point, learn to derive dopamine from the work itself, HOW ?
One of the best ways to make something repetitive is to stack intermittent rewards to it.
For example if you normally exercise with music (dopamine stacking) and you want to make exercise consistent, try some days to exercise without any music.
If you love a restaurant, try to go alone once, some others with friends, frequent it not so often, random changes are key.
Avoid prior or after dopamine rewards to tie it to the activity, that is actually detrimental, as it can label the activity itself as a chore, the main goal is to tie dopamine to effort, not to reward.