Euthyroidism, dopamine, computer games, and meditation
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Here are some ideas I've head recently which I hope you might find as interesting as me. Let's start in an odd place, some podcasts from Andrew Huberman, which I was listening to a few years ago, mention the idea of a "dopamine fast". In specific the idea that you can overcome various addictions by dopamine fasting, is put forward, and a specific anecdotal case of success is given where a child who is addicted to playing video games breaks the addiction by abstaining for 30 days.
Now this isn't so remarkable in itself, most "get out of bad habits"-programs deal with it this way, what's remarkable is that Huberman iirc posits the idea that your dopamine receptors need to be readjusted to normal levels, and that it's this very mechanism, of readjusting your dopamine receptors that makes you able to after a dopamine fast, then start enjoying other things in life.
Now I've had a personal experience a bit like this recently, I've always played a lot of computer games, but since I started peating, I have lost almost all interest. Sometimes, when I'm fatigued from a very active day, I might feel like playing video games these days, but I just rest on the couch instead, and once rested I feel like doing something other than games.
Now bear with me, I realize this post becomes long and maybe arduous to follow, since this isn't just a "help me fix this issue" question.
I would say that for durations in my life, I was addicted to video games, but then I started peating, and the addictions just melted away, I literally did not even try to quit. And this is where the two anecdotes come together with peaty ideas. Is it possible that the true mechanism of overcoming something like computer game addiction, is actually just the process of becoming euthyroid? And that the computer game addiction itself, is along the line of what peat usually talks about with obsessive behaviors, trying to correct the situation in itself, with computer games being a, maybe in theory mostly, a restful and playful activity that you can safely engage in. Now in practice, games are actually quite straining, meaning the activity is not very restful.
And this happens to connect itself to dopamine fasting in a profoundly strong way, namely, dopamine inhibits TSH. Meaning if you are dopamine engorged from a wonderful computer game, your TSH will be inhibited, meaning your metabolism will tends towards stress.
And also the contrary, that if one engages in a dopamine fast, your TSH will rise and, given thyroid/liver health, you might become profoundly euthyroid.
This now connects back to the title, lastly, which is really the reason I'm posting, meditation. Since I would assume, that something like mindfulness retreats (vipassana in specific iirc), where food is plain, and even things like eye contact is to be avoided, to be "less stimulated", essentially give your body a place to become very thyroid dominant, because of a profoundly full dopamine fast.
Has anyone tried meditation in relation to thyroid dominance, or wish to maybe warn against the use of meditation in general? I'm interested in starting a practice of what I would personally call, boredom meditation, but this of course happens to be much like what most quiet kinds of meditation aim towards anyway, except their frame is maybe towards silent bliss, rather than boredom.
My goal would be to have a meditation practice which I can use to quickly become thyroid dominant at will, (after adequate nutrition of course), leveraging the idea that you lower dopamine to increase TSH, and which then stimulates the whole thyroid dominance. And I would seek to do this in the morning most days for example.
Thank you for reading, and thank you for the forum.
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My take is that dopamine is a powerful serotonin antagonist. You aren't addicted to video games, your serotonin levels are too high and the body is trying to lower them by doing something that increases dopamine levels. It's not a dopamine "addiction", the dopamine is a cure your body is subconsciously seeking out. When you are healthy you no longer need a cure and thus you also no longer seek out dopaminergic activities.
I think neuroscience, neurobiology and psychology all fall into a impressive sounding hogwash that has nothing to do with reality. If you have trouble with sleep, with addiction, appetite or even trouble with violence then it is not the fault of your brain. It is the fault of your hormones. You need an endocrinologist, not a neurologist.
Furthermore, sometimes it is better to have no solution than a bad solution, because a bad solution might prevent you from finding the actual solution. Thus there is some point in trying abstinence, however just in so far that it can motivate you.
