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Comment by tananan | Hacker News Reader

Study finds you enjoy doing things you like. If there's something you particularly like, you seem to enjoy it even more.

If you are missing on some form of pleasure in your life, substituting it for another pleasure can help alleviate the pain.

Woah.

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I used to live near a nice downtown with a riverwalk. I liked to take my guitar and go play under the bridge at night. The bridge was concrete and the reverb was crazy good. (Does that make me a troll? A troll posting on the internet??)

I found it terribly soothing. Sometimes I'd bring a friend with and we'd play together.

I assume you listened for kids walking over the bridge and then jumped up "Who is trip tropping over my bridge". One of my favorite actives, and done right the kids laugh (don't get too close or do anything else that would make the kids scared!)

This was Naperville, IL. So that kind of behavior is very risky.

You could get sued for 10 million dollars. Or these days, deported to Aurora.

You just reminded me of one of my favorite Tony Joe White songs, so thanks!

Tony Joe White - Even Trolls Love Rock and Roll https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fJMNJTEhuw

The study also explains that one feels less lonely when listening to their favourite music, which is kinda new to me. I mean, feeling better makes sense and is quite obvious, as you sarcastically say, but I wouldn't think that listening to music makes one feel less alone.

Depends, if you listen to Emo/sad/heartbreak songs you will probably feel much more lonely.

The cause or the effect? I would actually guess no for the effect, since music preferences are associated with community membership.

I wouldn't assume that sad songs make you more lonely. For someone dealing with grief, it may act as drug-free therapy. Perhaps deepened sorrow at first, but when one deals with grief, mental state and behavior can improve.

Unstructured therapy is exactly as effective as it sounds. You're just as likely to process the emotion as you are to enable and reinforce it.

Taken too far, wallowing in the pain becomes a perverse pleasure in itself, a bit like cutting or other self harm.

I think it's the opposite. Those songs are good because you find someone can relate to you and therefore you would feel less lonely. Maybe not less sad, but more connected.

When I work from home, I usually listen to Sade, Brandy, Monica, Faith Evans, and similar music. Although the music is often about heartbreak, it doesn't make me sad. I find it calming.

I listen to sad songs with great regularity and jam the hell out to the sheer musicianship within, actually.

I wonder if it may be beneficial even if you're not naturally willing to do it, similar to how introverts feel better after acting extroverted [0] [1]

[0] https://archive.is/Ipdxc

[1] https://online.ucpress.edu/collabra/article/7/1/29931/119109...

:) pleasure is the gateway experience into enjoying yourself

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