Why Do We Crave What's Bad For Us? Part 1.

"I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing." - Paul

Yesterday Riker was telling me about how he learned about temptation in Sunday School. I actually had been thinking about the topic myself lately. Why is it that we crave things that are bad for us? Two examples:

I often crave an ice cap from Tim Horton's. Especially in the evening. The thing is that if I have one I will literally be awake all night. Since I never drink coffee, my body is unused to such high levels of caffeine. I know this, I've experienced the sleepless nights and yet . . . I still occasionally buy them. Then I suffer for it. Then I do it again.

Another thing I often do is play this online tank battle game called BZFlag. This game isn't really that fun, I play for way too long, and my arm gets cramps from using the controls. I almost always regret playing it (as it is major procrastination tool). Yet, I'm still tempted to play all the time and I often give in.

It's really bad for me, but I want it anyway. This is pretty illogical! Yet it seems that this kind of affliction affects us all. For some reason, what we get out of the "bad thing" is more motivating then the repercussions of it. I think of addiction; addicts know that a substance is bad for them, but the high they get from it drowns out all objections. The fact that we crave what hurts us (or can even kill us) is remarkable. Why do so many extremely smart people (presidents, pastors, etc) risk their entire career and reputation on an affair? Suddenly their reason is out the window. To me, this one of the greatest proofs that we have truly a sinful nature. We have conflicting desires and for no good reason, the bad desires often win. Tomorrow I'll talk about strategies to beat them.

May Light increase!