Getting off the pleasure pain rollercoaster

January 03, 2025

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What makes it so hard to keep resolutions?

Is it ingrained patterns of behaviour that are hard to change? Is it that the desire for comfort and pleasure keeps trumping the ungraspable desire to be a better, fitter, more successful version of ourselves? Or is it the desire to escape pain and discomfort which we associate with the pathways to achieving that better version of ourselves?

Wanting to declutter, make better food choices, and read more books are all worthy objectives but the follow through falters at many levels and perhaps all three play a part in thwarting us from reaching that perfect version of ourselves that we aspire to.

The incessant urge to seek pleasure in a world that is constantly offering instant gratification and dopamine hits, propels us on a perpetual rollercoaster of highs and then plummeting lows. The only way to get off the rollercoaster is to dig within ourselves to identify those triggers that keep driving us off course.

Know thyself

In order to achieve external success, we need to master our internal selves. In order to master our internal selves, we need to understand why we behave as we do, and what drives us.

Dopamine overload

Annie Lembke, in her book Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence, talks about the brain’s “pleasure-pain balance”. She likens our response to pleasure as a seesaw. When we experience pleasure, the balance tips toward pleasure, but the brain compensates by tilting it back toward pain to maintain equilibrium, causing a crash. The higher the pleasure soars, the further we plunge afterwards.

This is why the more we over-indulge in the activities that give us pleasure, the more suffer a “dopamine deficit”, leading to the opposite feelings of dissatisfaction or even withdrawal symptoms when the activity is stopped.

Addictive substances and behaviours – like checking our phones constantly – hijack the dopamine system, producing a surge of pleasure, but also causing long-term dysregulation.

Over time, repeated exposure to high-dopamine activities reduces baseline dopamine levels, leading to tolerance (needing more of the activity or substance to achieve the same effect).

Dopamine fasting

Lembke advocates for “dopamine fasting” as a way to reset the brain’s reward system. This involves abstaining from pleasurable stimuli for a period to restore the balance and sensitivity of the dopamine system. Some people go further and retreat into a cave to deprive themselves of the stimuli and reset their dopamine function.

Any Muslim reading this will immediately make the connection between this concept and the manual Islam gave us 1400 years ago – with its emphasis on restraint, abstinence and fasting, let alone the fact that the Prophet (peace be upon him) received the revelation in a cave, where he had been secluding himself.

Fasting for a month certainly offers a release from the highs and lows – coming between us and our addictions – whether they are to food, technology or other pleasures. Worldly life becomes monotone but spiritual life is heightened. Itikaf – seclusion, which the Prophet (peace be upon him) practiced in Ramadan is also an escape which many find leads to greater clarity and spiritual strength.

The price of pleasure

Islam is not against pleasure, but understands that pleasure comes with a price – from the dopamine deficit that ensues, as well as other costs, such as obesity and health problems from overeating, poor sleep from screen addiction, or clutter from the thrill of buying and hoarding…

Zuhd

Islam, as always, has a solution, a methodology and a training course to help us attain the higher goal, to extends beyond our flesh and our baser drives, to the pleasure of the soul, which is incomparable to any pleasure that the dunya holds.

While modern society inundates us with high-dopamine activities, from social media to processed foods, which overstimulate and dysregulate our dopamine system, leading to dissatisfaction and a search for more intense pleasure. No wonder that ironically, that it is wealthy countries that experience greater levels of dissatisfaction and suicide.

As the fight between the nafs and soul rages, zuhd offers us a way out. Zuhd is the ability to detach from the stimuli that give us pleasure in this world. It is often called asceticism and seen as abstinence from pleasure, but this does not mean living in an abject state – one can practice zuhd even if one is well-off as long as one does not become attached to their material possessions.

The one who practices zuhd is called zahid or zahidah, meaning the one who is not dominated by the dunya. It does not mean isolating yourself, but breaking the hold of the dunya on you. If we can achieve this, our resolutions could be achieved.

According to Ghazali, zuhd comes from the realisation that the afterlife is lasting – that this world compared to the akhirah is like a piece of clay or glass compared to a jewel.

Imagine a world that wasn’t driven by attachment to material things. Imagine the peace that would spread across the globe, the end to conflicts and bloodshed. Imagine the tranquility that would be in our hearts.

The solution for not hitting dopamine highs and subsequent lows, and for getting a grip on those cravings, is zuhd. If we know our triggers, and begin to override them, we can practice zuhd. The more zuhd we practice, the less we will be attached to dunya and beholden to the whips of desire. Our dopmine levels would be reset and inshallah our resolutions would be kept.

So, before embarking upon our resolutions, perhaps we need to gain more insight into our own selves. And then we will be better equipped to fight our nafs, and overcome the obstacles to achieving our goals. Of course, we ask Allah for His support and help.

As the Prophet (peace be upon him) would often say in the opening du’a of his salah:

اللَّهُمَّ اهْدِنِي لأَحْسَنِ الأَعْمَالِ وَأَحْسَنِ الأَخْلاَقِ لاَ يَهْدِي لأَحْسَنِهَا إِلاَّ أَنْتَ، وَقِنِي سَيِّئَ الأَعْمَالِ وَسَيِّئَ الأَخْلاَقِ لاَ يَقِي سَيِّئَهَا إِلاَّ أَنْتَ.‏‏ (النسائي)

Allahumma ihdini li-ahsani al-a’maali wa ahsani al-akhlaaqi la yahdi li-ahsaniha illa anta, wa qini sayyi’a al-amaali wa sayyi’a al-akhlaaqi la yaqee sayyi’aha illa anta.

O Allah, guide me to the best of deeds and the best of character, for none can guide to the best of them but You. And protect me from bad deeds and bad character, for none can protect against them but You. (Nasa’i)

May Allah enable us to free ourselves from the shackles of our desires and elevate us in this life and the next. Ameen.

Scientific information in this blog provided by Malath Shakir, BSc MSc, nutritionist and health coach.

The dunya delusion

Ghazali on Zuhd

Ghazali on love of dunya

Ghazali on the pleasure of seeing Allah

Ghazali on remembering death and aspects of the soul