Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Womankind

    The chemicals of happiness

    Oct 29, 2018 5 minutes
    By Loretta Breuning
     Words by Loretta Breuning
    California, United States

    The brain chemicals that make us feel good are inherited from earlier mammals. Dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin trigger feelings that are easy to understand when you know how they work in other animals. We humans have a big cortex that can inhibit our primal impulses, but the cortex does not control the happy chemicals. If you want to feel good, you have to make peace with your mammal brain.

    But the animal facts of life are hard to accept. We like to think animals are loving and cooperative, but in truth they have a lot of conflict. Animals compete for food and mating opportunity, and they enjoy a spurt of happy chemical when they prevail. When they lose, cortisol is released, so they have a lot more stress than you might imagine. Animals don’t theorise about their frustrations because they

    You’re reading a preview, subscribe to read more.

    More from Womankind

    Womankind3 min read
    The Simple Path
    You stand on the high lip of the property, looking over its young orchard, and across a valley of sunflower and barley fields to the woods on the opposite ridge. On the horizon you see the outline of church spires, and the gentle undulations of the B
    Womankind7 min read
    Eyes Open
    Please tell us a little about your experience shooting the women for the series RIPE. How did you find these women? And what was the experience like photographing them? I had observed that strong and confident older women were largely underrepresent
    Womankind2 min read
    Going Out On A Limb
    Of late, artist Monica Rohan has been obsessed with a tree. It was the inspiration for an oil painting, and more recently a drawing in ink. “It’s an amazing tree that arches over and leans on itself like a snow gum,” she says, speaking from her rente

    Related