Everything Is F*cked

Figure 6.1: A child thinks only about his own pleasure, whereas an
adolescent learns to navigate rules and principles to achieve her goals.
This  is  maturity  in  action:  developing  higher-level  and  more  abstract
values to enhance decision making in a wider range of contexts. This is how
you  adjust  to  the  world,  how  you  learn  to  handle  the  seemingly  infinite
permutations  of  experience.  It  is  a  major  cognitive  leap  for  children  and
fundamental to growing up in a healthy, happy way.
Young  children  are  like  little  tyrants.
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 They  struggle  to  conceive  of
anything in life beyond what is immediately pleasurable or painful for them at
any given moment. They cannot feel empathy. They cannot imagine what life
is  like  in  your  shoes.  All  they  know  is  that  they  want  some  fucking  ice
cream.
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A  young  child’s  identity  is  therefore  very  small  and  fragile.  It  is

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constituted  by  simply  what  gives  pleasure  and  what  avoids  pain.  Susie  likes
chocolate. She is afraid of dogs. She enjoys coloring. She is often mean to her
brother. This is the extent of Susie’s identity because her Thinking Brain has
not yet developed enough meaning to create coherent stories for her. It’s only
when  she’s  old  enough  to  ask  what  the  pleasure  is  for,  what  the  pain  is  for,
that  she  can  develop  some  meaningful  narratives  for  herself,  and  establish
identity.
The knowledge of pleasure and pain is still there in adolescence. It’s just
that pleasure and pain no longer dictate most decision making.
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They are no
longer  the  basis  of  our  values.  Older  children  weigh  their  personal  feelings
against  their  understanding  of  rules,  trade-offs,  and  the  social  order  around
them to plan and make decisions. This gives them larger, sturdier identities.
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The  adolescent  does  the  same  stumbling  around  the  young  child  does  in
learning  what  is  pleasurable  and  what  is  painful,  except  the  adolescent
stumbles  around  by  trying  on  different  social  rules  and  roles.  If  I  wear  this,
will  it  make  me  cool?  If  I  talk  like  that,  will  it  make  people  like  me?  If  I
pretend to enjoy this music, will I be popular?
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This  is  an  improvement,  but  there’s  still  a  weakness  in  this  adolescent
approach to life. Everything is seen as a trade-off. Adolescents approach life
as  an  endless  series  of  bargains:  I  will  do  what  my  boss  says  so  I  can  get
money. I will call my mother so I don’t get yelled at. I will do my homework
so I don’t fuck up my future. I will lie and pretend to be nice so I don’t have
to deal with conflict.
Nothing  is  done  for  its  own  sake.  Everything  is  a  calculated  transaction,
usually made out of fear of the negative repercussions. Everything is a means
to some pleasurable end.
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The  problem  with  adolescent  values  is  that  if  you  hold  them,  you  never
actually  stand  for  something  outside  yourself.  You  are  still  at  heart  a  child,
albeit a cleverer and much more sophisticated child. Everything still revolves
around maximizing pleasure and minimizing pain, it’s just that the adolescent
is savvy enough to think a few moves ahead to get there.
In the end, adolescent values are self-defeating. You can’t live your entire
life  this  way,  otherwise  you’re  never  actually  living  your  own  life.  You’re
merely living out an aggregation of the desires of the people around you.
To become an emotionally healthy individual, you must break out of this
constant  bargaining,  endlessly  treating  everyone  as  a  means  to  some
pleasurable  end,  and  come  to  understand  even  higher  and  more  abstract
guiding principles.

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