Almost anything you give sustained attention to will begin to loop on itself and bloom

When people talk about the value of paying attention and slowing down, they often make it sound prudish and monk-like. Attention is something we “have to protect.” We have to “pay”1 attention—like a tribute. But we shouldn’t forget how interesting and overpoweringly pleasurable sustained attention can be. Slowing down makes reality vivid, strange, and hot. Let me start with the most obvious example. As anyone who has had good sex knows, sustained attention and delayed satisfaction are a big part of it. When you resist the urge to go ahead and get what you want and instead stay in the moment, you open up a space for seduction and fantasy. Desire begins to loop on itself and intensify. I’m not sure what is going on here, but my rough understanding is that the expectation of pleasure activates the dopaminergic system in the brain. Dopamine is often portrayed as a pleasure chemical, but it isn’t really about pleasure so much as the expectation that pleasure will occur soon. So when we are

saved by

• Ashna Nirula