http://www.collective-evolution.com/2016/04/11/8-great-ways-you-can-increase-dopamine-levels-in-the-brain-without-pharmaceutical-drugs/
1. Don’t Get Addicted
“Many people get addicted to
something because it gives them some kind of instant gratification – drugs, alcohol,
sex, pornography, shopping, and other addictive behaviours actually have the
opposite effect on dopamine levels in the long-term. In essence, when we get
overly addicted to something, the ‘reward circuitry’ of our brain kicks into
overdrive and we crave the ‘quick hit.’ This is not a sustainable solution for
dopamine production, which can and should be done naturally.”
What’s missing here is the fact that addiction is
quite often a result of low dopamine, meaning addiction is more of an attempt
to fix an already existing problem. In essence, “the underpinning of your
addictive personality is a lack of fulfillment from within, with a resulting
urge to achieve fulfillment through substances, objects, or events that relieve
the inevitable pain – for a while.”(source)
“When we receive a reward of any kind, dopamine is
released in our brains. Over time, this stimulus and release of dopamine can
lead to learning. Researchers have recently found that how quickly and
permanently we learn things relates directly to how much dopamine we have
available in our brains. As we get rewarded over and over again
for something, we learn that we should keep doing whatever that is very deeply,
and it’s hard to unlearn those kinds of behaviours.” (source)
What this means is that low-dopamine is a response
to a lifestyle which doesn’t offer much in terms of reward to the person living
it. It may be a response to the environment you’re living in, the clothes
you’re wearing, the tight budget you’re working within, the relationship
choices you’ve made or have been made for you, or a result of trauma where
there was no perceived reward. It’s very easy to understand how dopamine levels
may appear low when we consider all the potentials leading to less-rewarding
lifestyles and life-experiences.
What’s necessary then is less of a ‘don’t get
addicted’ approach and more of an ‘increase the rewards in your life’
style of applied advice. Fact is, you’ll constantly feel less fulfilled through
low dopamine when you’re not (or are unable to) fill your day with things that
inspire and reward you. Meaning, the most effective protection against
addiction and greatest advantage to high-dopamine levels is a defense against
low-rewarding activities and an offence working towards rewarding actions,
activities, and ultimately, a lifestyle of fulfillment and achievement.
Also, because addiction is most often rooted in
past traumatic experiences, where emotions create a fight or flight response
that becomes rooted in your core emotions, it’s vitally important to seek
proper and effective help in dissolving past trauma. Doing so can only help you
perceive more rewarding experiences in your life, rather than filtering
experiences through a ‘traumatized’ awareness.
3. Create Something
“For us writers, painters,
sculptors, poets, singers, dancers, and other artists, we can identify with
this. When we’re in creative mode, we can become hyper-focused. As a result, we
can enter a state called flow. Dopamine is the brain chemical that allows
us to achieve this state. The lesson is this: take up a hobby or activity in
which you actually create something tangible. Try something like arts, crafts,
auto repair, drawing, photography, or something else that sounds interesting.”
Sparking your creative drive is an effective way to
increase your potential for feeling great, achieving goals and inspiring
yourself through your accomplishments. However, it can also be a distraction
from a feel-bad lifestyle, if it’s not maintained with a purpose in mind.
Whenever you’re working on a project, creative or not, that truly inspires you,
you’ll activate your ‘flow state,’ where time and space seem to stand still. So
how to you determine what it is that truly inspires you?
The most important goal in revealing your most
authentic creative energy is to remove the creative energies of other
people from your life. So many of us look up to the creations of others,
whether works of art or music, and their works or talents take up time and
space in our own minds. This isn’t necessarily bad, but it can influence your
own beliefs about what you can create. If you compare yourself to others and
minimize yourself, you’ll repress your own creative ability. This can affect
your dopamine levels, because if you can’t see your own creations as rewarding
to you, as much as someone else’s, you’ll feel inferior and incapable.
One very effective way of neutralizing the
influence other people have on your mind is to literally look at the negatives
or downsides of their accomplishment. This isn’t to practice being a critic,
but it can enable you to de-infatuate with their creative powers, helping you
to stop minimizing your own. Once you recognize that your creative
endeavors can exist on the level of those you admire, through practice (just
like they did), you’ll increase your ability to see your own creations as
meaningful and rewarding.
So, to avoid having to regularly boost the ego to be a happy person, get creative and accomplished and gain self belief.
So, to avoid having to regularly boost the ego to be a happy person, get creative and accomplished and gain self belief.
