Admiration Junkie

The Human Thirst for Approval

The human thirst for admiration is a thirst both deep and fatal

Of course, admiration is Gatorade for the Ego, no?

The Buddha talked about eight worldly concerns:

· the hope for gain and the fear of loss;

· the hope for pleasure and the fear of pain;

· the hope for good reputation and the fear of bad reputation;

· the hope for praise and the fear of blame.

And isn’t praise simply the verbal face of admiration?

When Gotama Buddha referred to the worldly concerns he was indeed voicing a warning: do not get involved, attached, greedy for, absorbed by these concerns, either of which will ground you squarely in samsara and make for a very rough life for even if you attain either of the eight, he would also point out, all things are impermanent and those who praise you today (like your sales-manager boss who’s only concern is “What have you done for me lately?”) are not unlikely to reproach you tomorrow.

Likewise, today’s gain is always short-lived, pleasure fades much faster than you’d like, and reputations — especially in a gossipy neighborhood or country — are always fickle (just like the weather in Denver).

So, those who thirst for admiration — a recent President comes to mind — are forever thirsting, for no admiration is deep enough, warm enough, or lasts long enough to quench such thirst: each new day you wake up parched and even though you can auto-admire your mirrored face and tell yourself what a grand person you are and so handsome too, that doesn’t even last till breakfast when you’ll be scouring the morning papers for any mention of you (admirable mentions, mind you) or checking the news channels to see what talking heads might admire you this morning.

I know that admiration is a wonderful drug. Sort of a cousin once or twice removed to sexual gratification. It’s a warm, codeine-like rush, that glowing gush that tells you how much they love you, how great you are, and how you cannot do anything wrong even if you tried — and funny, too, such a great sense of humor.

Oh, I can see how you can get hooked on this, but just like heroin, you can never truly quench this thirst (though it might be hard to overdose on admiration — what would happen? Overinflated, you’d explode?).

It was either Gotama Buddha or one of his disciples, or some later equally wise man, who said that the truly happy man (or woman) was he (or she) who was quite content with what they had. No desire for change at all. Content is the word. Content.

The man dying of admiration thirst will do anything to swing the stage lights in his direction for the worst fate to befall any living thing is to be ignored, he knows that, or even worse, not even noticed (you have to notice in order to ignore, no?). So good news or bad doesn’t matter at this point, as long as he is noticed for as soon as he is only an idiot will fail to see how wonderful, admirable, he is.

The man dying of admiration thirst can never rest, not really. Even in his dreams he’s chasing recognition and abhorring going unnoticed. Admiration is more precious than oxygen. Without it, the ego will slowly deflate and then deflate some more to eventually, following that trajectory to its logical conclusion, die. And death is no good.

At all.

Desperate for another admiration fix the junkie will brag, exaggerate, lie, blame others, tell awful jokes, and then brag some more about his (normally average or just below or simply terrible) accomplishments. Pictures to prove them. Here, see?

At heart, no one is lonelier than the admiration junkie.

No one is closer to ego-death than the admiration junkie.

No one is unhappier than the admiration junkie.

Remember the word content.

© Wolfstuff

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