Dopamine isn't the pleasure you feel right now, but the anticipation of something good coming. It spikes when you expect a reward, not when you get it. Winnie the Pooh's unnamed moment before eating honey is dopamine at work.
And dopamine can feel very, very good when we experience it, but it's a certain kind of pleasure. It's a pleasure that is focused on the future. Dopamine really has nothing to do with the present moment. It's always about what's possible, what's new, what's more, what we don't have now. And so we get hits of dopamine when we anticipate something. It's that feeling of excitement, of interest, of feeling alive. There is a wonderful quotation in the book Winnie the Pooh, of all places, that I think characterizes dopamine so well. Christopher Robin asks Winnie the Pooh, what's your favorite thing in the world? Pooh is about to say eating honey, but before he does, he thinks that there's a moment just before you start eating honey that's even better, but he doesn't know what it's called. And that's dopamine. It's the expectation of some kind of a reward.
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