Bananas were harder to eat in the past than they are now. The seeds are huge and rich, running through the meat of the whole fruit, the fruit itself is more starchy, stricter and sweeter.
Other foods are just as blunt. For example, watermelon – no longer a continuous pink meat, but is hidden in small portions of small seed-like shapes divided by thick white peel. Pre-modern corn is much smaller, with the core’s shell hard. Meat can be tough and sharp and you may have to go to a deadly battle to get it.
Basically everything is like a pomegranate, at least in the image: full of skin, membrane and hard fragments, and it takes some work to get the good stuff. It is not accidental that chronic overeating is rare.
I was thinking about this the other day, before lunch time, when I drove home from the gym. I have a McDonald’s on my route, which is basically the countdown to the pomegranate – the arrival of the goods has become as easy as possible. The street has a wide funnel-like approach that even invites the largest vehicles to easily enter. The arrows lead you into two parallel pass lanes, so the line usually has only one or two cars. At this point, all you have to do is say, “Take me a cheeseburger!” They say, “Yes, right now!” Then you go to the one-way funnel and someone puts the burger in your hands. You will card touch some electronics and the invisible computer solves the currency side of the transaction.
The cheeseburger itself is the easiest food in the world. Soft, warm but not hot, no surprises, no skin, no bones, and even no effort to collect it and bring it to your face. This is what every caveman dreams about – an almost frictionless way to add 300 calories into the body. An adult man can eat one in fifteen seconds, so he will get two or three.
Mental resistance is also minimized. By the time you even turn into a car driving, your brain will dive into the Hamburg admissions program. Billions of dollars have been spent training you to train your mind from childhood to enter the burger burger mode, i.e. it instantly recognizes the golden arch, the smell of pancakes, the clown wearing yellow jumper, or any other related utensil.
Even before this, natural selection of eons makes you a creature to overcome any friction that exists with the environment’s once rare heat energy. You are born with the will torn membranes, gnaw around the seeds, and fire yourself in the Yebest.
These forces combine to make the friction at the express entrance so high that you may have to suppress yourself to avoid encountering unplanned McDouble and Fries in the passenger seat.
Two hundred years ago, there might be no way to accidentally eat beef sandwiches. Even if you assemble something like this, friction must be overcome, which means it can only be done on purpose. Actually, there is too much friction between your sandwiches. A lot of tillage, milling and grazing must be done, and even components must be purchased.
The amount of friction between you and actions you may not take or may not take varies with your environment. While your ancestors are fighting for huge friction to drive the plowing hard earth in hopes of making enough food, or walking six miles to town to hear the latest news, you might be with Super-Low– The troubled doomsday spin and the dangers of doordash.
Of course, besides these new low friction traps, we still face our own high friction challenges. Going towards a better career, fighting the crowd, improving your fitness as you age – all friction. The barbell fights you on each rep. Lactic acid screams at you to stop running. If only the friction level is adjusted correctly, we can easily accomplish all the healthy, beneficial things and avoid excessive harm.
Humans do have something called willpower, which is the ability to resist gravity and friction. You might go into a caloric deficit in an incredible snack choice, just like you’ll go to the plowing land despite bugs, stones, and your pain. Willpower is what makes civilization possible.
This is a limited resource. When it runs out, you will drag with the current and end up always being bigger and stronger. The power of evolution, nature and mass media can toss us like the ocean, even the most powerful swimmers can toss.
This is why you shouldn’t swim to the shore when you get stuck in RIP current. Instead, you should swim parallel to the shore to cross the waves to enter. Your power can’t overcome the power here, but you can use it to attract useful power and avoid helpless power.
Another way to consider this is that navigating life is mostly about managing friction. Rather than using wills as an engine that moves you directly to the best of your life, do this by wisely utilizing those greater natural forces – the inevitable human desire for comfort, stimulation, recognition and freedom from pain. You have to use limited power to get these forces to drive in the right direction.
For example, I could try to try myself by exercising a samurai discipline, eat after meals, and eat after meals. Actually, my success may depend on whether I set it in the Riptide by saving the cookies in the house. I can give up on devastating scrolling forever, but whether my willpower is enough depends on the frequency of my routines, I can use my phone at all.
“Arrange the environment for success” is not a new idea, but I think it’s easy to underestimate its role in the results. I think it’s not only a useful boost, but it’s more like 80% or 90% of the whole process.
There is a tremendous power behind and below our actions, and if we are to make the most of the will, we must respect that. If you can at least see where the friction is extremely high and where the danger is, you can adjust the course accordingly.
***
Photos of Hu Chen, Cristina Marin, Wikimedia Commons
