2. Seeking excitement is one of the great pleasure-trends of life. In moderation, tension, expectation and the diffuse bodily reactions are agreeable; there is a feeling of vigor, the attention is drawn from the self and there is a feeling of being alive that is pleasurable. The tension must not be too long sustained, nor the bodily reaction too intense; relaxation and lowered attention must relieve the excitement from time to time; but with these kept in mind, it is true that Man is a seeker of excitement.
This is a factor neglected in the study of great social phenomena. The growth of cities is not only a result of the economic forces of the time; it is made permanent by the fact that the cities are exciting. The multiplicity and variety of the stimuli of a city--social, sexual, its stir and bustle--make it difficult for those once habituated ever to tolerate the quiet of the country. Excitement follows the great law of stimulation; the same internal effect, the same feeling, requires a greater and greater stimulus, as well as new stimuli. So, the cities grow larger, increase their modes of excitement, and the dweller in the city, unless fortified by a steady purpose, becomes a seeker of excitement.
Not only is excitement pleasurable when reached through the intrinsically agreeable but it can be obtained from small doses of the intrinsically disagreeable. This is the explanation of the pleasure obtained from the gruesome, from the risk of life or limb, or from watching others risk life or limb. Aside from the sense of power obtained by traveling fast, it is the risk, THE SLIGHT FEAR, producing excitement, that makes the speed maniac a menace to the highways. And I think that part of the pleasure obtained from bitter foods is that the disagreeable element is just sufficient to excite the gastro-intestinal tract. The fascination of the horrible lies in the excitement produced, an excitement that turns to horror and disgust if the disagreeable is presented too closely. Thus we can read with pleasurable excitement of things that in their reality would shock us into profoundest pain. The more jaded one is, the more used to excitement, the more he seeks what are, ordinarily, disagreeable methods of excitement. Thus pain in slight degree is exciting, and in the sexual sphere pain is often sought as a means of heightening the pleasure, especially by women and by the roue. I suspect also that the haircloth shirt and the sackcloth and ashes of the anhedonic hermit were painful methods of seeking excitement.
Sometimes pain is used in small amounts to relieve excitement.
Thus the man who bites his finger nails to the quick gets a degree of satisfaction from the habit. Indeed, all manner of habitual and absurd movements, from scratching to pacing up and down, are efforts to relieve the tension of excitement. One of my patients under any excitement likes to put his hands in very hot water, and the pain, by its localization, takes away from the diffuse and unpleasant excitement. The diffuse uncontrolled excitement of itching is often relieved by painful biting and scratching. Here is an effort to localize a feeling and thus avoid diffuse discomfort, a sort of homeopathic treatment.
3. As a corollary to the need of excitement and its pleasure is the reaction to monotony. Monotony is one of the most dreaded factors in the life of man. The internal resources of most of us are but small; we can furnish excitement and interest from our own store for but a short time, and there then ensues an intense yearning for something or somebody that will take up our attention and give a direction to our thought and action. Under monotony the thought turns inward, there is daydreaming and introspection,[1] which are pleasurable only at certain times for most of us and which grow less pleasurable as we grow older.
Watch the faces of people thinking as they travel alone in cars,--and rarely does one see a happy face. The lines of the face droop and sighs are frequent. Monotony and melancholy are not far apart; monotony and a restless seeking for excitement are almost synonymous. Of course, what constitutes monotony will differ in the viewpoint of each person, for some are so constituted and habituated (for habit is a great factor) that it takes but few stimuli to arouse a well-sustained interest, and others need or think they need many things, a constantly changing set of circumstances for pleasure.
[1] Stanley Hall, in his book "Adolescence," lays great stress on monotony and its effects. See also Graham Wallas' "The Great Society."
Restlessness, eager searching for change, intense dissatisfaction are the natural fruit of monotony. Here is an important item in the problems of our times. Side by side with growth of the cities and their excitement is the growing monotony of most labor. The factory, with its specialized production, reduces the worker to a cog in the machinery. In some factories, in the name of efficiency, the windows are whitewashed so that the outside world is shut out and talking is prohibited; the worker passes his day performing his unvaried task from morning to night. Under such circumstances there arises either a burning sense of wrong, of injustice, of slavery and a thwarting of the individual dignity, or else a yearning for the end of the day, for dancing, drinking, gambling, for anything that offers excitement. Or perhaps both reactions are combined. Our industrial world is poorly organized economically, as witness the poor distribution of wealth and the periodic crises, but it is abominably organized from the standpoint of the happiness of the worker. Of this, more in another place.
