Why You Should Focus on Low Dopamine Activities with High Rewards

It’s difficult, but these things can help your life.

There I sat once again, with my browser open to ten different tabs on Twitter.

I was in the zone, man, doing reply after response, hitting all the best notes of conversations that could be done in 240 characters or less. It felt great, but I knew I was doing something that would make absolutely no difference to my career at all.

How would it better my life, beyond a simple dopamine hit that would last seconds? Was I making a difference in the life of someone else?

I had to admit, I probably wasn’t.

We get caught up in the random and pleasurable.

There are certain things we get caught up in because they feel great to do. Surfing randomly, watching a YouTube video, eating a little (or big in my case) piece of cake, all give us that jolt we think we need. Unless that YouTube video or surfing randomly is for research purposes, though, is it really doing anything to make sure tomorrow I earn more than I did today?

I used to host talk radio shows. I found myself spending so many hours reading politics and news because I thought it’d be useful for the shows. In the end, though, they were just dopamine hits, and most of the things I saved in my notes never saw the light of day again.

It was an activity I got addicted to, and it was detrimental to the overall quality of my shows until I saw the light of day.

These small things that we could term “low value but high dopamine” events are perhaps the most addictive. They make us feel good for a small moment, and Lawd knows we all could use a hit in these days we’re living as we swirl around this dust bowl we call Earth.

The pandemic made it easy.

The pandemic, for instance, really caught people up in this kind of activity. Depressing news surrounded us on the 24/7 news cycle of doom and gloom. People were in a constant state of fear and paranoia, all while being locked in homes they’d rather do anything but be stuck in.

People needed to process it somehow, and they found that solace in small, but effective, dopamine hits.

I posit, though, it’s the highly valuable, but low dopamine things we need to focus on more. Not just to further the states of our careers, but to grow as people, too.

There are things as a writer I could do to foster change.

I’ll use the example of myself as an author to explain how I look at these things.

One of the most effective things I can do for my career as an author is to write. It’s really that simple. The more I write, the more chance there is for exposure to happen to the right people.

I could do that through writing articles, or through focusing on putting more books out. Either way, having my butt in the chair and my fingers on the keys potentially earns me money.

Outlining the idea for a book, writing headlines for articles, editing articles before I tap publish, or even reading about writing or subjects I’d like to talk about are great things to do for me as an author.

But those things take time. They take effort and energy, and sometimes I just don’t have the “spoons” available to make it happen. Top it all off with the fact I’m blind and some days I just can’t focus as I should. It makes it simple for me to say, “Nah. Forget this.”

At the same time, however, those are the things that will guarantee I have a chance to be successful.

I could write, or I could plan what to write… or I could plan to plan.

Are you guilty of that, too?

I admit it… I avoid doing what’s best for me.

High value targets with the activities you do in your life make more of a difference than those momentary rushes you get from simple things. They’re more difficult, though, so it’s so much easier to avoid doing them altogether.

Exercise is pretty essential, but it’s one thing I avoid the most. I have a lot of pain issues because of arthritis and fibromyalgia, so getting the body moving sometimes is the last thing I want to do. It sucks, but I know I should.

Do I? Rarely. It’s because it’s hard, and I don’t like hard.

Yoga? Definitely a big pass for me. It’s recommended for people with my conditions, but you’ll probably never see me on a mat doing the Falling Dog or something. Is that a thing?

Meditation doesn’t work for me, because I have DiD. People with that issue rarely succeed in doing meditative practices because the alters just come out when there’s a lull.

See the excuses?

Cooking takes energy. Clothes shopping is mind-numbing. Don’t get me started on editing books. That’s the bane of my existence.

Cleaning, practicing something I know I should get better at, revising previously written articles and books to make them even better… those things are difficult.

I try to do them all, though, because I know come tomorrow, they are going to show benefit.

Even if it’s just a matter of me being 1% healthier than I was the day before, it’s something more than I had.

They’re tedious, but essential.

Low dopamine activities are rarely fun and exciting. They’re boring, they are the chores we know we’d love to avoid, but they will always be for the good in the long run.

They are, in the end, what makes the biggest difference to our lives.

What’s exciting about these activities is, perhaps, that they make it so when you do the high dopamine things, they’ll be even more effective.

You can appreciate them more, because you’ve done all the boring work before.

What are some high value but low dopamine activities you do? Or avoid?

The irony is after writing this article I had a piece of cake.

Other things from me:

About me:

I am an author with over a dozen books and dozens of short stories published. I have experience with both traditional and self-publishing and love to discuss the pros and cons of both.

Why do I write? Because I am blind and live on woefully low disability payments each month. The government graced me with trying to live on about $700 per month, and I decided to start publishing because I also like to be able to eat.

If you like my work and feel inclined to support it, please consider buying me a Ko-Fi.

Thank you from the depths of my soul for being here. Keep striving to “be the best you that you can be” at this moment.

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