I am going to make one last important point here which is that I only live by my own values and not the values of others. Therefore, I do not live by the values of others who tell me that I should and would be a great person for pursuing my composing dream anyway without my pleasure. I also do not live by the values of others who tell me that I should let go of my own values and open up to other ones. My own personal values are what now at least truly make me the better person despite my anhedonia and depression.

If it were somehow proven to me right now that I would never be able to recover my pleasure, then the only thing that would make me the better person would be for me to end my life. Therefore, I am the better person for giving up on my dreams and I am the better person for ending my life. Me accepting my loss of pleasure, moving on in life, and pursuing my composing dream anyway, this would make me and my life inferior and worthless since I would be living by the loathsome values of others and not my own hedonistic values.

Now as for anyone who would tell me that I would be selfish and such for ending my life in the event that my pleasure doesn’t recover, then you honestly expect me to live my life having no personal good life of my own to experience pleasure in? Furthermore, for you to expect that from me would mean that you have utterly demeaned my own personal value as a human being and my life for rejecting my desire to have a personal life of pleasure of my own. You would have rejected my own personal good value that I have which would be my right to have a life of full pleasure.

Now the reason you would be inferior if you had depression and/or anhedonia is that people such as us experienced pleasure so profoundly and meaningful that we have embraced such feelings of pleasure (pleasure being all good feelings including love) as a vital part of who we are as people. Therefore, to lose such feelings would deem you as an utterly inferior human being and would also deem your life as completely worthless and inferior as well. Feelings of pleasure are a vital part of who we are as human beings (much more important, greater, and far superior to our personality, attitude, and other characteristics as human beings). So this is why you would be utterly inferior if you were to lose such feelings.

• This reply was modified 9 years, 11 months ago by Matt.

@Snails: The only thing I am doing in my life now is therapy and medication because that is the only thing at this point that ever has any hope of easing up this anhedonia because everything else has failed. As for all the other words of advice given here, all my arguments I’ve made here refute them all. So I will also post another convincing argument that refutes the idea that we are somehow good people and that our lives are somehow good without our pleasure and are good independent of our pleasure:

Now speaking in terms of evolution, our minds are designed to experience emotions from our perceptions (thoughts) for a very important reason. First off, our thoughts are nothing more than what is used for rationalizations and problem-solving while our emotions are what encourage our survival in life. So if you have the perception (thought) that there is a wild animal that is going to attack you, that would then send an emotional signal to the fear center of your brain in order to encourage you to get out of there so that you survive. Same thing with experiencing pleasure. Pleasure is what also encourages us to benefit our survival and the survival of others as well (although pleasure can be misused in not benefiting our survival such as harming ourselves and others). Where I’m getting at with all of this is that our thoughts alone do not encourage our survival. The word “good” means “looking forward to things in life,” “being encouraged in life,” etc. But you cannot be encouraged in life without any emotions since only our emotions (as well as pain) are what is designed to encourage us to survive. The quoted term “looking forward to things in life” as well as any other terms for the word “good” are all derived from what only pleasure can achieve since “good” means “Our encouraged survival in life to benefit ours and others survival.” Thoughts alone without our emotions may make us do great things in life and make us benefit ours and others survival. But that is not the same thing as being “good” (our “encouraged survival in life”). Same thing applies with having no fear or any other emotions, but choosing to run away from a wild animal that is attacking you anyway. That is not the same thing as our “encouraged survival” either while you are running away from this dangerous animal in order to survive. Also, “good” and “bad” are both our “encouraged survival in life.” The difference is that our encouragement to survive in order to benefit ours and others survival (which would be pleasure) is the “good” version of our “encouraged survival.” But things such as fear, pain, and despair are evolution’s “warning” version of our “encouraged survival” since they warn us that something is wrong in life. So “warning” in terms of evolution is what is “bad” which makes pain and despair the bad version of “encouraged survival.” Therefore, this is why only pleasure is good while only pain and despair are bad while everything else in life is neutral (neither good or bad). So this is the reason why you cannot be a good or bad person and that your life cannot be good or bad if you did not have feelings of pleasure, pain, or despair.

Now there may be other definitions of the words “good” and “bad” out there that others might have proposed, but they are all still derived from our evolutionary design which would be our “encouraged survival” in life (which would, again, be definitions that are derived from our emotions as well as our pain). If, for example, another definition of the word “good” means objects and people that help us avoid suffering, anything that helps us accept our losses and move on in life, or our actions of helping others, then even that is derived from pleasure and can only be achieved through pleasure because someone might then tell those with anhedonia (absence of pleasure) to be encouraged in life knowing that these things are good and that his/her actions of helping others is good despite his/her loss of pleasure. But as I just stated before, this person cannot be “encouraged” or “look forward” to those things in life without his/her pleasure since pleasure is the only thing that can achieve those quoted things (pleasure being all good feelings including love and motivation). The term “looking forward to” and any other such terms here are derived from “our encouraged survival” since you cannot look forward to anything in life without being encouraged. Even things such as value, worth, and beauty are also derived from “our encouraged survival” (which would be pleasure). Other things in life aside from one’s own pleasure might be defined as “good,” but without our encouragement (pleasure), then this version of “good” is nothing more than a neutral thought that doesn’t make us or our lives anything “good” in reality without our pleasure. Same concept applies for “bad.” Even if we were to somehow redefine the word “encouragement” to something else besides our pleasure and then tell someone to be encouraged in life knowing that there are other good and greater things in life aside from his/her pleasure, even this would still be nothing more than a neutral thought. As I said before, our “looking forward in life,” “being encouraged in life,” etc. is all derived from our own pleasure. So this is the reason why people are only fooling themselves into thinking that they are good people and that their lives are somehow good independent of their pleasure or if they had no pleasure in life. These thoughts of “good” and “bad” or any other created meanings for that matter that these people have are all nothing more than neutral thoughts. As I said before, thoughts are just thoughts no matter what they are and the only difference is that they are different sounds, images, words, etc. and that is all. They might send different signals to different parts of the brain, but even those other parts of our brain besides our pain and emotions are not our “encouraged survival” (meaning, that they are neither good or bad) and nor is anything else in life good or bad either aside from our own pleasure, pain, and despair. You are also not in the minds of others and cannot experience their pleasure, pain, and despair. Therefore, it is only your own pleasure, pain, and despair that are the only good and bad things from your own perspective while the pleasure, pain, and despair of others are the only good and bad things from their own perspectives. The pleasure, pain, and despair of others from your own perspective is neutral since it is nothing more than a neutral thought. Even if it is a good or bad value you have towards the pleasure, pain, and despair of others, that is still nothing more than a neutral thought. Therefore, how good one is (their level of greatness) and how good one’s life is solely depends on the level of pleasure he/she has in his/her life. Same thing applies for how bad one is and how bad his/her life is.

• This reply was modified 9 years, 11 months ago by Matt.

Now the reason why I say that even Hitler himself is a better person is not only because my personal experience of pleasure says that it is the only thing that defines your own personal value and worth as a human being. But I also say this because it is an exaggeration and expression of how frustrated and angry I am with my meaningless and worthless life of no pleasure since pleasure is the only greatest thing to me in life. I will create shock value and revolutionize the perspective of others to make them think twice about them viewing other things in life as greater value than their own pleasure as an expression of my rage and frustration towards my life of no pleasure. Me expressing this will also be likely to make others take me seriously and realize just how important pleasure is for me in life and make them have compassion and understanding towards my loss of pleasure and just how important pleasure is for me in life.

I also said before that I have found at least a little bit of value and worth in my life in trying to fully regain my lost pleasure through medication, therapy, etc. So if this is the case, then why can’t I also find greater value and worth towards other things in life than my pleasure? It would be because it all still comes back to my own personal experience of pleasure being the greatest thing to me in life and my personal experience of how losing that through depression and anhedonia is the worst thing for me. Therefore, the only life I find to have at least some value and worth would be for me to live my life in trying to fully recover the very thing that made my life worth living and of great value in the first place (which would, again, be my pleasure). Again, I realize that bringing others pleasure in life is important for them. But despite the fact that I do value the pleasure of others and view it as important in life to bring them pleasure, this still does not make it anything good from my own perspective since all my thoughts, perceptions, and created meanings are neutral (neither good or bad) and it is only my pleasure that is good since I am not in the minds of others and can’t experience their pleasure. Even me living my life trying to fully regain my lost pleasure is neutral as well at this point. However, I still do these things anyway since I still value my own pleasure just as much as anyone else’s. But no matter how much value I put towards the pleasure of others, that will never take away from the value I have towards my own pleasure since my personal experience of pleasure says to me that it is the greatest thing for me in life. So even if I were to have someone in my life whom I have immense value and love towards despite my absence of pleasure (such as my mom or anyone else), I would still feel very depressed and enraged towards my own loss of pleasure despite me living solely to bring these people pleasure. Also, having less value towards my own pleasure would make me the lesser person with a lesser life as I stated earlier in my writing anyway. Therefore, me having both full value towards my own pleasure and full value towards the pleasure of others is the closest thing right now to making me a great person despite my own absence of pleasure. However, I am nowhere near as great as I would be if I had my full pleasure in life right now. Also, even me perceiving myself as being at least somewhat great for having full value towards my own pleasure and the pleasure of others still does not make me or my life anything good or great at all. It just simply makes me perceive me and my life as at least being of some value and worth despite the fact that me and my life have absolutely no value and worth without my pleasure.

I am now going to explain something else as to why I value pleasure so much which is that there are characters in anime (Japanese cartoons) that I perceive as superior god-like beings with superior god-like personalities. A few example of these characters are Cell and Vegeta from the anime Dragonball Z. They are examples of the most awesome characters since they are god-like with god-like powers and are megalomaniacs who wish to have power and control in their lives and have superior god-like personalities and wish to obtain god-like powers.

Now there is a term known as “Anthropomorphism” which is when you attribute your perceived personality of other living things, objects, and people, to other living things, objects, and people (including your own self in which you feel like a different person, but you can still act as the exact same person). Therefore, when I had my ability to experience pleasure in the past, I would anthropomorphize these characters as a part of me in order to feel their awesome superior god-like life essence coursing through me. This gave me superior intense god-like feelings of pleasure since I felt like I was these characters. Pleasure, to me, is “life force (essence)” that is the ultimate defining aspect of a human being which will not only make you a human being, but can also enhance you to a level that is beyond human metaphorically speaking (which would be enhanced to the superior god-like status of those characters). These characters were, therefore, a part of my conscious and they have, metaphorically speaking (not literally speaking), bestowed me with their superior god-like life essence. This is what made me feel powerful in a superior god-like sense.

Another example would be with the character Amy Rose (a female hedgehog) from Sonic the Hedgehog. I perceive her as a superior god-like being not only because she is not human, but is an animal-like being in human form which I would define as an “angel” since angels are animal-like beings in human form. She is also a superior god-like being since she has an unreal personality (personalities that normal human beings don’t normally possess). Her personality is very fantasy-like and vigorous. This is unlike the personality of normal human beings since the personality of normal human beings are more “settled” and “down to Earth.” So it would seem as though the creators of anime make the personality of characters more life-like as well as superior and god-like to match their superior god-like world (environments) as well as their superior god-like forms. Amy (as well as other such innocent god-like characters) display expressions of innocence, love, etc. that is beyond human (more intense) and profound that expresses their world and forms that are also beyond human.

Therefore, I have also embraced Amy as a part of my conscious as well which also made me feel powerful. But it did not make me feel powerful the way those other characters Cell and Vegeta did. Those other characters made me feel an “enraged epic” form of superior god-like pleasure. The form of superior god-like pleasure I have received from Amy would be a feeling of intense innocence and love.

In order for me to anthropomorphize myself as different characters when I had my pleasure in the past, it would all depend on what mood I’m in. If I was in an innocent and loving mood, then my mind would relate that to characters such as Amy and would anthropomorphize myself as Amy herself. Same thing with other characters such as Cell and Vegeta if I were instead in an epic and powerful mood. I could even anthropomorphize myself as different characters by literally acting as such characters in my own mind. However, if I was in a bad mood, my mind would anthropomorphize me with non-anime real-life personalities that I hate. Now how I feel normally as a person is when I don’t have any personalities (anthropomorphizations) applied to me and this is how I feel most of the time throughout the day each day. But I notice that as I go out and meet new people, my mind will then automatically anthropomorphize me based on my perceived personality through my interaction with this person when I meet with and talk with this person face to face.

Now if you are going to ask something such as why can’t I be in these anthropomorphized states all the time? It would be because my depression and anhedonia prevents this from happening. It is also because the mind is something that remains stable in a normal mood. Therefore, those “high” moods and “high” perceptions in which I am anthropomorphized as superior god-like beings, these are unstable mindsets that only last for brief moments. Other than that, I do not have such personalities attributed to me and I am in a completely stable and pleasureless mindset all throughout the day each day.

Even if these characters I love were to tell me to accept a lifelong loss of pleasure that never gets better or fully recovers, that would not cause me to feel any anger towards them or any disappointment at all towards them whatsoever. This is obviously because I know who they are and they are superior god-like beings with superior god-like personalities to me no matter what.

Also, it’s not how others think of you that determines who you are. Any personal meanings we create in life are all subjective and personal. Therefore, you can personalize yourself as being any character without any opinions from others as to who you are from their perspectives.

Now aside from that, I think you can see now why pleasure is so important to me and why I view it as the sole defining life force of a human being. Without that, then not only am I denied the awesome epic as well as the loving innocence of these superior god-like characters, but I am also denied of my own life essence as a human being that I normally experience on a daily basis through doing activities I enjoy such as playing videogames, etc. Me being denied those things makes me utterly inferior and makes me and my life of no personal value or worth. My plan was to tap into and channel these superior god-like feelings of pleasure from those superior god-like characters in composing music that is exceptional and beyond human in terms of its powerful conveyed superior god-like emotions and to experience these said feelings through my own created compositions as well as through listening to music. I also wanted to channel and experience my own normal feelings of pleasure as well through composing and listening to music. But this has all failed.

In conclusion, I would like to say that I am a megalomaniac who wishes to regain the most important thing to him (which would be my pleasure). I wish to have power, control, and dominion through pure pleasure alone over my life, over suffering and despair, and over other people who do not wish to help me, who have little to no value towards my pleasure, and who are mean to me. I will NOT be content, be at peace, or accept my life until I have my pleasure back. Even now as I am saying this, my own personality is being anthropomorhpized as Vegeta who is a psychopath who will not back down until he has his “powers” back and is able to rule and dominate over his life again. It’s just my own personality that is being anthropomorphized as Vegeta’s and not my pleasure since I don’t have any pleasure at the moment. But I swear, I will try all I can to regain my lost “powers” (my pleasure) and I will rule and dominate over this life through my pleasure in composing and through just being happy in life in general with very little suffering and despair in my life. And THEN I can experience the awesome life essence (pleasure) of these superior god-like characters as well as my own normal human pleasure once again.

If I live my life accepting my loss of pleasure and not doing anything to try and regain it, then my mind will give me anthropomorphizations (personalities attributed to me) that I hate. But if I live my life not accepting it and become “enraged” to try to gain it back through therapy, medication, etc., then my mind will give me personalities that I love such as the personality of Vegeta (although I cannot feel pleasure from these personalities at the moment). So this is a main reason why I will only choose to live my life in ways that will give me attributed personalities that I love. Otherwise, I will instead have attributed inferior personalities that I hate and will forever hate myself and my life as a result. Just like how I hate people who have little to no value towards my feelings of pleasure who tell me to accept, be at peace, and be content with a lifelong loss of pleasure that never gets better or fully recovers, these anthropomorphizations (attributed personalities) are also exactly the same in that sense. In other words, I would have become these very people I hate by living my life through acceptance, being at peace, and being content with a lifelong loss of pleasure that never gets better or fully recovers.

Also, you can compose music that has dark, gothic, and tragic emotion to it through pure pleasure alone anyway (the pleasure of dark, gothic, and tragic things). You can create these types of music through pure pleasure alone and they can be just as good (and even better) than if you created them through your suffering and despair. You can also grow as a person just as good and even better under the right circumstances through pure pleasure alone without any suffering or despair in your life since the brain is something you can change at will and you can be a better compassionate person at any given personal level and such through just changing your attitude and through other things in life besides suffering, despair, and a lack of pleasure.

Finally, who you are as a person and everything else in life is all neutral (neither good or bad) from your perspective and has no effect on your personal value and worth as a person. The only thing that makes you a better or lesser person is your amount of pleasure in life regardless of who you are as a person.

Here is a summary:

My belief is known as “Scientism” (as well as “Materialism” and “Naturalism”) which state that life has no meaning and has no good or bad meaning and that everything in life is “neutral” (neither good or bad) and is just a bunch of meaningless atoms and particles. However, this only applies to all things in life besides our own pleasure, pain, and despair as I’m going to explain here (which are the only good and bad things in of themselves independent of all other neutral things in life). They are even independent of neutral ideas (thoughts) such as ideas others might state such as that life is not about pleasure and seeking only it for yourself will bring consequences to you and everyone else and will even bring you and others the opposite of pleasure as well as much more suffering than pleasure for yourself and others. So my version of those beliefs quoted above is that everything in this universe besides pleasure, pain, and despair are meaningless (neither good or bad) while pleasure is the only good thing and that pain and despair are the only bad things despite the fact that these things are also the functioning of atoms and particles.

This is because pleasure in of itself always feels good no matter what and no matter what meaning you attribute to your pleasure while pain and despair will always feel bad in of themselves no matter what and no matter what meaning you attribute to your pain and despair. Some people might claim that pain feels good to them, but they would be lying. It is only the pleasure itself that is obtained from the pain that feels good to him/her while the pain stands alone by itself as feeling bad. Same thing applies if you were to somehow feel that your pleasure feels bad to you in that it would only be the pain and/or possibly despair that you obtained from your pleasure that would feel bad in of itself while the pleasure would still feel good in of itself. Pleasure, pain, and despair can also never feel like neutral (neither good or bad) sensations such as touch, smell, etc. So they stand alone as the only good and bad things themselves in life separate from everything else and separate from the atoms and particles of other things in life that cannot define our pleasure as being neutral or bad or our pain and despair as being neutral or good. Therefore, good is pleasure, bad is pain and despair, and neutral (neither good or bad) is everything else in life besides our own pleasure, pain, and despair. But if you are going to say something such as that just because these feelings feel good and bad still means that they are just a bunch of meaningless atoms and particles, this would be false because there is no separation between these feelings feeling good and bad and them being a bunch of atoms and particles. Good and bad are the functioning of those atoms and particles that yield pleasure and suffering just like how the atoms and particles yield other materials and chemicals. Also, what I mean by pleasure is all good feelings including love. I do not mean only a limited spectrum of good feelings when referring to pleasure.

One final very important point I would like to make is that I have depression as well as severe chronic anhedonia (emotional numbness) in which there are never any brief moments of pleasure whatsoever. Therefore, I feel that my life is worthless and that there is nothing good about me or my life without my own pleasure and this is why I wish to discuss this issue and my personal beliefs.