Heaven And Hell

What holds the structure of your existence? Whatever it is, is it determined by your desire for a utopian destination (Heaven), or is it determined by your fear of a dystopia (Hell)?

In this piece, I will be attempting a psychological breakdown of the idea of Heaven and Hell. This breakdown could work in the literal or figurative sense. So, I hope you have a good time on this page.

A Utopian Desire

All of human existence has been marked by different forms of inventions, upgrades, and updates. The constant desire for an easier and better life is all that has driven our species through its multiple stages of evolution. But the question remains… where does it end? Would it be possible for humans to achieve this idea of heaven on earth?

Over years, we’ve been upgrading and optimizing our lives towards some conceived “better life”. But what is the ultimate better life? Perhaps a world where humans are laid back and all our day-to-day basic tasks are now being performed by intelligent robots?

Is it a world where all humans do is eat, get fat, live irresponsibly, and never have to worry about dying? Or do you suppose it is going to be a futuristic cyberpunk world where we merge with robots and become some kind of superhuman? Is that our ideal heaven? Or the pursuit of heaven doesn’t stop there?

In the year 2023, the glut of modern conveniences already dulls our brains, reducing what little is left of our capacity for thought and function to jobs best suited for artificial intelligence, robots, and modern appliances.

It can get better, as it can equally get worse. We may be on our way to heaven. We may also be on our way to creating a dystopia.

In many sci-fi movies and books, every intention to create a paradise-like atmosphere turned to hell. Convenience might be the death of humans. We are simply not built for it. We are beasts of burden.

One might even suspect that something is wrong somewhere when convenience becomes a norm. Life gets to perfect. You begin to wonder what horrible things lie ahead. Whether you are in a dream, or whether you are being lied to. This is a typical experience as a Nigerian. You suspect something is wrong somewhere when the power supply is constant. Perhaps even too constant. You begin to wonder about the possibility of never seeing power for some days once they cut the supply.

You must have seen it in plenty of movies and TV shows. In The Walking Dead, for example, each time Rick and his folks end up in a new place that seems a little too perfect, they look around for where things might not be as they appear, and that’s exactly what they discover – that nothing is as they seem. Humans are not comfortable when everything is a little “too good to be true”.

They find in some place that the perfect couple hosting them eats that guest after some time. The idea that humans are built for a perfect existence is false. There is always something lurking somewhere. Something sinister.

Isn’t this analogous to the Garden Of Eden that God created? But somehow, it isn’t so perfect, because there is a snake in that same garden. And throughout history and the stories we write and act out, it is the same predominant theme.

“God tells humans not to eat from this fruit, else they will gain knowledge and consciousness of the real world. Humans refuse to listen, and they basically ‘fucked around and found out’, which caused them to be sent out of their perfect world”.

“Host tells guest not to check the basement or their bedroom, but the guest does anyway, and their false reality is instantly shattered by their discovery of the crocked things that lie in the darkest of corners.”

Human Nature

Psychologically speaking, as humans, we crave independence and autonomy. So it comes as no surprise that most of us don't like being told what to do. Even babies have the instinct to go to the exact place you warned them not to go. This instinct of exploration is as human as it gets.

This is why Fyodor Dostoevsky in his Notes From The Underground said cynically in his protest against the idea of a paradise that: “Shower on him every blessing, drown him in a sea of happiness, give him economic prosperity such that he should have nothing else to do but sleep, eat cakes, and busy himself with the continuation of the species, and even then, out of sheer ingratitude, sheer spite, man would play you some nasty trick.”

He protests that man is not made to sit down and live happily ever after. He must engage in something. He must have the freedom that keeps him sane. Otherwise, he will run mad. Out of sheer ingratitude for the paradise that has been created for him, he will break something, go where you warned him not to venture, and eat what you warned him not to eat. He will do everything to remind himself that he is still in control. That he is still human.

He elaborated further that man will run mad when all his 2 + 2 equals 4. There will be no room for him to explore – to have an adventure. That is his nature. That is our nature. We are not built for utopia.

Like Albert Camus also rightly argues, our is to live like the Greek king that was punished by Hades for cheating death. Like Sisyphus, we roll an immense boulder up a hill only for it to roll back down every time it neared the top, repeating this action for eternity.

In pop-culture reference, this is what we call “same shit, different day”.

This same argument was what Thomas Hobbes laid down when he said Thomas Hobbes postulates that men are driven by a perpetual and restless desire for power after power, which ends only in death. The miserable consequences of this drive for power and the competing “desire of ease and sensual delight” and “fear of death and wounds” lead them to establish and obey a government that is in control of all aspects of their lives. This government is what is called the Leviathan. But in retrospect, he is talking about a totalitarian dictatorship.

You could tell someone not to check the messages on your phone. But whether consciously or unconsciously, what you’ve done is implant a sense of curiosity in them.

In the world of Gulliver's Travels, all of Gulliver’s destinations were hell (dystopia) that had the false appearance of something akin to heaven (utopia). Same thing with the world of George Orwell’s 1984. It was a dystopian world that had the appearance of a perfectly functioning system.

The Ministry of Truth, the Ministry of Peace, the Ministry of Love, and the Ministry of Plenty… all built on lies.

Even Hitler's strategic program for world domination was based on the belief in the power of Lebensraum, especially when pursued by a racially superior society. This was his utopia. His idea of heaven. But creating this utopia came at a significant cost. He dragged the entire world into a war (1939 - 1945). Add to that, the internal repression, the holocaust, the executions, pogroms, genocide, etc…

One man’s heaven is another man’s hell.

Every time there’s been a human attempt to create anything paradise-like, the unintended consequence is usually the case.

What do you suppose a utopia would be like? I am of the argument that we are simply not created for that. But oftentimes, this paradise idea is what we consider to be the final resting place – the afterlife.

This is supposed to be a psychological breakdown. But perhaps I will write later on the idea of an afterlife.

Before now, there existed many cultures that with their idea of what heaven is, and what hell is. With this understanding, the entire structure of their existence is centred around the fear of hell and the desire for heaven.

Their entire “faith” in the multitude of gods was centred around this idea. For the Nords, they had gods like Odin the All-father, Freya, Thor, etc. Their heaven was Valhalla, and their hell was Hel. Viking warriors will be willing to be slaughtered on the battlefield, all for a chance to dine with the gods in Valhalla.

The ancient Greeks had Elysium for paradise, and Tartarus for hell. For the ancient Egyptians, they had Aaru (Field of reeds) which is paradise, and Duat for hell. Although most will argue that the ancient Egyptians never believed in a proper hell. The Yoruba had Oorun as paradise and Apaadi as hell.

In almost every culture, there is a clear distinction between heaven and hell. If there is no clear distinction between both domains, there will be some symbolism in place to help the people within any such culture to regulate their behaviour. A moral compass, if you will.

This leads me to the next segment.

Conditioning

Classical conditioning theory states that behaviours are learned by connecting a neutral stimulus with a positive one. To simplify it, it is a behaviour that is created with regard to a positive outcome. In some cases, it is a behaviour that is created based on an anticipated reward.

Even when the reward is taken out of the picture, a neutral stimulus can still condition certain behaviours within a person or an animal. For example, stubbing your toe will result in cries. This is an unconditioned stimulus in action. It wasn’t trained or anything. It is simply a natural response.

But you can be trained to behave in a certain way based on anticipated reward. You can be asked to act in certain manners, and you may choose to act accordingly because you’ve been told your rewards lie in heaven.

Most people don’t believe in God. If they did, they would be scared to death each time they act against His words. It is their belief too, that regardless of how sinful they get, as long as they don’t denounce God, they have a chance of not going to hell. After all, isn’t the greatest of sins polytheism? Or even atheism.

People can be conditioned in any given way. Religious fanatics (extremists) often find themselves being victims of this problem. They can be sold ideas that will result in the desired outcome of the conditioning. Remember, classical conditioning is the connection of neutral stimuli to positive ones.

Right from childhood, you may be conditioned to believe that every religious conflict you engage in will end in your success as a candidate for paradise. Where the rivers are full of milk, the lands are filled with honey, you never grow weary, and you could have all your earthly desires. Sounds like a pretty good deal right? Well.

What about Communism and Nazism? They are both ideologies that tried to create a “paradise” in their own ways. But they’ve both failed dastardly. They have simply resulted in millions of deaths, and have equally engraved a mark into the minds of those who are aware of history that the practicality of a “heaven on earth” is far from possible. It is dystopian in its nature. A stillbirth of idealism. That is all they are.

George Orwell’s Animal Farm is a good representation of how a good idea of a utopia is all but an illusion of something that when rationalized, it is dystopian in its nature. Most times, it is simply the iron law of unintended consequences that manifests itself, before we realize how deep in the weeds we are. But it is impossible for people to see past the logical flaws in any ideology that promises a utopia. After all, gravitating towards something we believe is a net positive is in our nature.

We like convenience. We are humans.

Heaven on earth may be far from pragmatism, but hell on earth is definitely the object in the mirror – it is closer than it appears. Imagine that hell is everything in your life that you can make worse. That is what hell is. Hell is the descent into the worst possible situations.

Everyday life is already as hellish as it can be. But it can be worse for sure. So, let’s talk about the other type of conditioning – Operant Conditioning.

It is a type of conditioning where the consequences of a response determine the probability of it being repeated. Through operant conditioning behaviour which is reinforced (rewarded) will likely be repeated, and behaviour which is punished will occur less frequently.

In this case, the fear of hell (punishment) makes you behave in some ways. To simply this type of conditioning, imaging every scenario where the consequence of an action makes you want to do less of the action or refrain completely from it.

For classical conditioning, A + B + C. An action is performed here. For operant conditioning, you’ll have C at the end. What C stands for will determine the behaviours of A and B. But this is beside the point.

Most people only hold onto their beliefs out of their fear of hell. These people are simply afraid of burning in the unending anguish that hell brings. This fear of hell is preached to them in every aspect of their life. They haven’t been conditioned to actually believe in God or a utopian idea. They’ve simply been conditioned about all the horrible things that lie ahead if they stray from a desired/righteous path.

“Don’t do this (operant conditioning) or else you will go to hell. Do this (classical conditioning), if you wish to go to heaven.”

The secret to life is to create our own heaven. Our own paradise. The entire philosophy of Buddhism is the belief that life is suffering. We all want to believe in something, believe in someplace. And perhaps, we deserve a resting place that is better than what we experience on this planet. Perhaps it is necessary we condition ourselves. After all, a hierarchy of values helps us aim for the best outcome of our endeavours. For if you are not aiming somewhere, you are simply all over the place. Almost like a schizophrenic patient. So, nothing truly is wrong with aiming for the best thing.

In the midst of the horrors of life, your paradise can be someone, a place, a song, a movie, a moment…

Utopia is not achievable because humans are not built for it. But in the midst of all the imperfection, we can gravitate towards something that produces the best outcome that will work well for everyone. This idea which isn’t birthed by idealism, but by realism.

I shall end this piece with a quote from Sadhguru, one of my favourite spiritual leaders. He said, “Heaven and hell are not physical locations, you create them within yourself.” The first step to being in paradise is to be at peace with yourself.

In our pursuit of unending happiness, we may be stuck in a mental stimulation of relying on cheap dopamine from porn, movies, music, sex, social media, and social validation… but sometimes, we need to detox. Take a break from the internet. Go out with your friends. Read some books. Write down your thoughts. For there are better ways to live, than actively avoiding boredom.

In our desire to maximize and optimize our lifestyle, we may be stuck on actively chasing the best new thing. This is called the Diderot Effect.

The Diderot Effect states that obtaining a new possession often creates a spiral of consumption, leading you to acquire more new things. As a result, we end up buying things that our previous selves never needed to feel happy or fulfilled.

You buy new shoes, then you realized you also need to get new clothes, then new phone, wig, perfume, soap, skin care products, etc, etc. It goes on and on. An unending phase of consumption of material things we believe make our lives somehow less depressing. It is usually never this deep. But it is a fabric of our humanity. We like conveniences, adoration, love, attention…

We are humans.

Epilogue

This is the denouement of my piece on Heaven and Hell. Thank you for reading through. Remember to leave a comment, share with your friends and clap on the post (this helps with algorithm and whatnot). You may find me here on Twitter.

Once again, thank you. Cheers!