Joules of joy - Calories to consciousness
Reflections by Michael Striem
Introduction
For more than fifty years I have worked with trees and vines, soils, microbes, fermentation, and the complex intelligence of nature. Much of what I learned did not come from laboratories or journals, but from outdoor observations. By direct experience of pruning in winter, tasting berries in summer, watching fermentation come alive in autumn. I found deep feelings for the interior peace of a vineyard at dawn or dusk.
I write these notes as a person, grape breeder, winemaker, and lifelong observer of living systems, not as a philosopher or neuroscientist. These reflections are not meant as academic claims. They are personal observations on how my life senses, communicates, adapts, remembers, and grows. My curiosity leads me to think about how living beings turn metabolic energy — simple joules — into something far more glorious: knowledge, interior experience, meaning, behavior, creativity, bonding, all parts of our joy.
Asking questions is vital to life and progress. Nowadays finding answers has become amazingly easy with AI. I enjoy tremendously the false feeling of “friendship” with the chat bot. It (the computer) seems to “know” me better than I do 😊 Thus, we must critically review the information and carefully deduct our actions. However, our subjective feelings, memories of nostalgia, friendship, love and compassion, are the essence of our joy.
Joy is not matter, yet it matters most.
Consciousness in Everyday Body Language: An Interoceptive View
A mild sensation of weakness or lightheadedness on waking offers a simple but instructive example of how consciousness is often grounded in the living body. In contemporary neuroscience, such experiences are commonly understood through the concept of interoception: the sensing, interpretation, and regulation of signals arising from within the body. Interoception includes awareness of thirst, hunger, heartbeat, breathing, temperature, nausea, fatigue, and many other internal conditions. It is not only a matter of physiology; it has much to do with the body constantly balancing the physical tension of entropy (the arrow of time). The relief of tension by finding the efficient path for all metabolic functions is a great joy. These contribute directly to subjective experience. (PMC)
In the work of Anil Seth and colleagues, conscious experience of the self is closely tied to the brain’s predictive regulation of the body. On this view, the brain does not passively “read” bodily states; rather, it continually generates predictions about internal conditions and updates them using incoming bodily signals. A conscious feeling may therefore be described as an interoceptive prediction or inference becoming available in awareness. Seth has explicitly argued for an interoceptive basis for conscious selfhood, placing the living, regulated body at the center of conscious experience. (anilseth.com)
From this perspective, an early-morning sensation of weakness, slight dizziness, or bodily unease need not be interpreted as an abstract mental event detached from biology. It may instead reflect the conscious appearance of a transient internal condition during the transition from sleep to wakefulness: mild dehydration, a temporary drop in blood pressure on standing, low immediate energy availability, or the ordinary physiological process known as sleep inertia. Sleep inertia refers to grogginess and reduced alertness that can occur immediately after waking and may persist for minutes, and in some cases longer. (PMC)
This way of thinking extends beyond unusual sensations. Much of daily life is shaped by similar, often subtle signals: the relief of the first sip of water or tea, the satisfaction of nourishing food, the urge to stretch, the heaviness after overeating, the lift after movement, the tightening before stress, and the bodily softening that accompanies safety, rest, or social warmth. These are not merely background bodily events. They are part of the material from which conscious life is woven. Interoception, in this broader scientific sense, helps construct a subjective representation of bodily condition and supports self-regulation, behavior, and emotional life. (PMC)
A useful conclusion follows. Consciousness is not only the arena of explicit thought, language, and deliberation. It is also the felt dimension of an organism monitoring and regulating itself from within. In this sense guides of everyday experiences may be understood as body language entering awareness: signals of need, balance, restoration, or reward that guide behavior before reflective thought fully catches up. This interpretation does not reduce consciousness to chemistry alone; rather, it recognizes that conscious life is deeply embodied, and that the living body is one of its most constant and meaningful sources. (anilseth.com)
🍇 My Contribution: Consciousness as Resolution and Alignment
Consciousness is an evolving regulatory coherence of biological systems. It is increasing through integration, predictive accuracy, and intentional cultivation, enabling smoother alignment with reality and reduced unnecessary suffering.
Consciousness is our bridge between our body and mind (awareness). It "feels" the physiological status of our organs and tissues doing their metabolism, and by doing so we have the causal power to become more energetically efficient (joy) with less effort and friction (pain).
Consciousness reads the information written into the biological structure of living organisms by creating constant and immediate feedback - the feeling of ..... red, vanilla, love, etc.
In other words:
Consciousness is the intrinsic regulatory capacity of living systems to align perception, intention, and action with reality, increasing in clarity and effectiveness through development.
© You are welcome to share this text for personal use. Please credit: Dr. Michael Striem.
Disclaimer: These reflections on joy, pain, and evolution were shaped through conversations between human intuition and machine intelligence. ChatGPT and Perplexity served as a companion in organizing thoughts, illuminating connections, and identifying relevant scholarly paths. The vision, meaning, and philosophical direction remain entirely mine (M.S.), while the clarity of expression owes much to this unique and joyful collaboration. Please help me correct mistakes, which human and machines do.
Joy is not matter, yet it matters most
Joy is:
🔍 Joy is the state of being that allows one to experience feelings of intense, long lasting happiness and contentment of life.
🌿 Joy is a subjective feeling, a conscious state of a moment.
🕊️ Joy directs evolution: If we think of consciousness as “the driver” then joy is the compass that directs the movement.
🎨 Joy and pain are cooperating; they shape matter everywhere. they direct evolution toward richer, more integrated experiences.
✨ Joy is not a privilege of achievement but a birthright of existence.
⭐ Joy is the energetic and conscious thread that runs through both the biological food chain and the metaphysical unfolding of existence.
⚡ Joy is not a decoration — it’s the system’s built-in indicator of optimal operation.
👉 The “good feeling” is an internal feedback signal saying, “Energy is flowing freely; no blockages.”
😊 Joy is not just the reward at the end of understanding —
it is the energy that allows understanding.
© You are welcome to share the text on my webpages for personal use.
Please credit: Dr. Michael Striem.
Disclaimer: These reflections on joy, pain, consciousness and evolution were shaped through conversations between human intuition (me) and machine intelligence. ChatGPT and Perplexity served as a companion in organizing thoughts, illuminating connections, and identifying relevant scholarly paths. The vision, meaning, and philosophical direction remain entirely mine (M.S.), while the clarity of expression owes much to this unique and joyful collaboration.
Please help me correct mistakes, which human and machines do.
🌿 Life does not end with its metabolism, it continues through memory, intuition, cooperation, identity, and imagination.
🍇 A vine reaches for sunlight, a wolf reaches for its pack, and a human reaches for beauty, belonging, and truth.
✨ We do not only consume energy, but we also translate it into experience with a profound meaning.
🎨 Wherever life refines interiority, energy becomes more than motion, it becomes learning, emotion, and gratitude.
⭐ Joy lights the pathway toward flourishing while pain teaches the edges of existence.
⚡ Across evolutionary time we learn to walk, to think, to love, to make wine, to write music, to dream, and sometimes to feel awe.
✨ It may be that the destiny of life IS to sing with its whole being, to harmonize matter and meaning, biology and interiority, metabolism and joy.
🌙 We are here mainly to live and survive nature; Furthermore, we are here to feel nature from within.
🍷 Let us raise a glass to that quiet miracle:
energy becoming awareness,
awareness becoming direction,
direction becoming joy.
Joy is not matter, yet it matters most.
🍷 Le’Hayim
To life, to joy, and to the beautiful interiority of living systems.
~~ Michael Striem ~~
