Kyle Parco

At a show on his Solo Tour, John Mayer confessed: “I wait for most things to be over. I wait for this to be over to do the next thing and the next thing and the next thing and the next thing...” To counter this tendency, he implemented a rule. “Because I’ve realized, he said, “Everything you love and hate leaves at the same speed: Done. Done. Done. The thing you hate that you have to do tomorrow will be over before you know it, and the thing you're looking forward to tomorrow will be over before you know it.” “So I have a new rule in my life,” Mayer said, “and the rule is: Never wish for less time. Waiting for things to be over is just wishing for less time. Waiting for this to be over to get to the next thing—that's just wishing for less time.” “So wherever you go, just make a home right there and do that thing…Wherever you are, go, 'this is where it's all at right now.' I’ve been having the time of my life because I figured that out…” Takeaway 1: John's realization—that “everything you love and hate leaves at the same speed”—made me think of something that Dr. Anna Lembke writes about in her book Dopamine Nation: “One of the most remarkable neuroscientific findings in the past century is that the brain processes pleasure and pain in the same place. Further, pleasure and pain work like opposite sides of a balance.” “And one of the overriding rules governing this balance,” she said, “is that it wants to stay level…With any deviation from neutrality, the brain will work very hard to restore a level balance—what scientists call ‘homeostasis.’ … With any stimulus to one side, there will be a tip of an equal and opposite amount to the other side.” Pain and pleasure, good days and bad days, the things you're dreading and the things you're looking forward to—everything leaves at the same speed. Takeaway 2: The brain’s tendency to think about the next thing is called “prospection.” “Our brains were made for nexting,” the psychologist Daniel Gilbert writes in a chapter titled “Prospection” in his book Stumbling On Happiness. “When researchers count the items that float along in the average person’s stream of consciousness, they find that about 12 percent of our daily thoughts are about the future.” In other words, the average person spends 1 out of every 8 hours thinking about the next thing, “which is to say…each of us is a part-time resident of tomorrow.” We are constantly nexting, Gilbert explains, because of “the illusion of foresight”—the illusion that “prospection can provide pleasure and prevent pain.” The reality is that “the future is fundamentally different than it appears through the prospectiscope.” The reality is that (whether through the prospectiscope or in the present) everything—pain and pleasure, the things you're dreading and the things you're looking forward to—leaves at the same speed. - - - “So wherever you go, just make a home right there and do that thing…Wherever you are, go, 'this is where it's all at right now.' ... I’ve been having the time of my life because I figured that out...” — John Mayer Follow @bpoppenheimer for more content like this!