I have heard of a thing called pleasure. It sweeps across the desert, stinging my eyes and getting in under my clothes. Red faced and raw I let the force of it take me to the ground, obliterating my footsteps, erasing the past and all paths to the future. When the sand clears, I am alone. And the hunt begins again. Always, and unrelenting.
I am the dopamine hunter. Pleasure may be the prize, but the hunt is purpose. Dopamine is our driver, our “want” and motivation. In the hunt I am alive, directed, clear. Death falls into the abstract and I shake it off. Anticipation is an absolute, a full and declarative space to be. I have stalked my prey across cities, into strange alleyways and dark familiar corners…
Now, since coming back to Earth, it is only the want I crave. I miss the hunt. The pleasure prize was always shifting, arbitrary, a product of environment, genetics, and opportunity. But the chase has dug deep tracks in my brain and my dopamine system will take time to reset itself to new (healthier) motivations. But what do I look forward to when I feel most myself being where I’m not supposed to be, matching my motions to the whispers of tall grass? I need the hunt. I am the hunt.
My kitchen is a disaster and the bathroom needs to be cleaned. I wonder how people do it? Maybe you could tell me? What is there beyond the hunt? I don’t want to gather bits of things to sustain my humanity. I don’t want to martyr myself for some equally arbitrary cause. I don’t want to do it all for somebody else. I want to want!
And so here I am, chasing the most dangerous pleasure of them all. I dare to create. I dare to make real the nothingness of dreams and expose the root vision of self that has sustained me. Today I glory in my humanity by inviting you into your own. No more hiding out of sight in the tall grass… waiting. I work long hours the rest of this week, wearing my name tag with pride – albeit on someone else’s shirt. And I seriously need to do the dishes! But by creating this post I have fed my limbic mascot (Mitch the insatiable human itch) and I am whole… until the hunt begins again… tomorrow.
Blank Canvas Living 
You can change your metaphor from hunt and hunter to create and creator….create beauty in your life, one shiny bathroom at a time, one happy customer, one paragraph that enlivens, inspirits, reminds us of the humanity that is life…. wearing a name tag on someone else’s shirt is an opportunity to b present, offering ..what matters is that you are there, in service, in presence, a stopping place for others to pause, to be refreshed, to feel welcome, to feel seen, and in your time writing, write with joy, write your itch into a blessing, a grace….your greatest gift are these columns that remind me to live boldly….to be aware of the habits one falls into….such as messy dishes….and reach out to those who can lighten the burden….and make dishwashing, toilet scrubbing a ritual, a ceremony, you are creating a home for you and those you love….a joy to read your words on line….one can only imagine the gifts of writing that await, one paragraph at a time, a sentence that will arrive in a novel invitation for us to reimagine our lives anew….you are sailing a fine reach home, Cymbria…lean with the wind!
Your words are a true gift of heart and hope. I am absolutely honoured to receive them ☺️! These posts are anchor points in this fascinating journey of being human. I wake up to a new world every day, and it’s a delight and a blessing to have you along for the ride of our lives. Thank you 💞