This is Chapter 1, SEEKING of my third book (first book published in Japan in Japanese) “Awakening Into Awareness: Affective Emotional Neuroscience & Attention Therapies” set for publication January 2021. I will share the entire book, chapter by chapter up until the date of publication.

Awakening Into Awareness

1. Seeking

Why can’t we realize if we don’t make immediate changes, climate change is on course to destroy our planet? The answer is straight forward. We are mammals. Our higher executive cortex is slave to our lower subcortical emotional systems, just like other mammals.

The SEEKING system is one of seven primal affect systems documented in the rat lab experiments of Jaak Panksepp. Primal meaning that it exists as an objectless part of our neural brain system from the day we are born. SEEKING, like the other six primal emotion systems, becomes connected to the outside world through learning.

The SEEKING system is the brain source of eager anticipation, desire, and euphoria.  It is the quest for everything. 

SEEKING arousal inspires animals to enthusiastically search for food, water, and shelter. It inspires them to seek mates or if very young, seek their mothers.

But in humans, the SEEKING system remains alert even when basic needs are met. The system engenders excessive activities like overeating, alcoholism, gambling, and ill-advised sexual activities. The SEEKING system can too easily urge us to indulge in a wide range of activities without our stopping to carefully consider repercussions. If conditioning is strong enough, the higher mind does not resist the temptation that the lower mind wants to pursue.

The SEEKING system is without morality. It is the greed that allows us to gather as much of the rewards out there as possible.  It is the get-up-and-go-for-it system. So in order to reduce human tragedies like global warming, the SEEKING system needs to be trained in ethics and morality. 

The SEEKING system is driven by brain dopamine. But it is much more than just the creation of that one energizing neurotransmitter. It is a complex knowledge-and-belief-generating system. Our neocortex executive brain does not provide its own motivation; our neocortex is activated by our subcortical lizard brain.

SEEKING System Slaves

SEEKING System

Figure: VTA Dopamine Factory

Much of our motivation comes from our ancient subcortical SEEKING system. We sometimes pursue without really knowing why. The neocortex, the highest executive part of our brain and the source of human intellect is the servant of our emotional systems. 

Our SEEKING system impels our neocortex to find ways of meeting our needs and desires. 

Our SEEKING system urges our neocortex to do things that make us feel important and in command. 

Our SEEKING system prompts us to satisfy our liking for novelty. 

Our SEEKING system urges our neocortex to devise ways to gratify each and every one of our desires. It is a powerful ancient subcortical system overriding our rational brain and can get us into serious trouble. We are not rational creatures.

Our SEEKING system can all too easily urge us to indulge in a wide range of activities that our executive neocortex might want to consider before taking part. It does so by operating in the background, especially so when we are not in any particular need of resources or troubled by problems that require urgent need.

We drink too much. We eat too much. We check our emails and text messages far too often. We get hooked on drugs. We gamble away hard-earned money and sometimes engage in ill-advised sexual affairs. I hate to admit and find it hard to believe, I have engaged in all of these activities. When I look in the mirror I definitely do not want to see that man. So maybe, fortunately, he’s covered now in a disguise of pitiful blemishes and wrinkles.

Seeking Dopamine

Dopamine flows from the ventral tegmental area (VTA) to the hypothalamus, nucleus accumbens, and prefrontal cortex.  

The SEEKING system is fueled by dopamine.

 Dopamine is the main chemical that arouses the SEEKING system. Dopamine binds with molecules known as receptors. Excessive activity of dopamine at one of these receptors  (D2 receptor) causes or possibly only correlates with schizophrenic symptoms. Antipsychotic drugs block the receptor from binding with the SEEKING receptors and this reduces delusions and hallucinations.

When you block the dopamine receptors, you reduce the SEEKING urge and the psychotic symptoms. 

But you need a balance.

If you take away the SEEKING urge, you are left with depression and GRIEF.

When the SEEKING system is overstimulated but not enough to cause psychosis, it generates repetitive, ritualistic, and compulsive behaviors. This will happen even with animals.

Depressive feelings are a part of a chronically underactive SEEKING system. On the other hand, schizophrenia, mania, and psychotic delusions arise with an overcharged SEEKING system, when the system is grossly overstimulated with dopamine. Thinking runs wild, resulting in rampant and often erroneous conclusions. The enhanced sense of self, which is also typical of SEEKING arousal, can also take on unrealistic proportions, resulting in psychotic delusions of grandeur.

Drugs of abuse like amphetamines and cocaine are effective stimulants of the SEEKING system because they increase the availability of dopamine in the synaptic clefts, the communication channels between neurons. Such drugs are easily abused, and they hypersensitize SEEKING urges, making people even more responsive to addictive drugs.

When you block the dopamine receptors, you reduce the SEEKING urge and the psychotic symptoms. But you need a balance because if you take away the SEEKING urge, you are left with depression and GRIEF.

Adjunctive Behaviors

If lab animals are hungry but you only give them small bits of food and not enough to satisfy their hunger, the SEEKING system is aroused. But when they have no place to search for food, these animals engage in what is called adjunctive behaviors. For example, a hungry rat might run excessively in a running wheel. Another rat may shred paper. Another gnaws on wood. And another drinks copious amounts of water. These behaviors that are not related to their bodily needs are called adjunctive.

People who are hungry may pace back and forth. People denied sex and CARING may engage in a range of seemingly odd, repetitive, and ritualistic behaviors. Like me, perhaps, sitting at my computer all day researching and writing even on a glorious sunny day.

Jaak Panksepp said, “A major goal of psychotherapy is to promote cognitive control of affective processes.”  You can’t stop emotions from suddenly surfacing. You can’t stop thoughts and you can’t stop feelings from surfacing into your consciousness. But you can manage your SEEKING system and other prime emotions with Attention Therapies;  Ki Breathing Meditation, Open Focus, Insight Meditation, and Metacognitive and Cognitive therapy, though, these will be infective unless they are well understood and practiced on a regular basis so that they become tools you call on demand.