Pleasure As Antidote to Adversity

Pleasure may sound like a good idea that feels too far away right now. I get it, life is full of responsibilities,  disappointments, heartbreaks, and loss…. not to mention pandemics, oppressive systems, and other harmful threats.

If our environment is making us stressed, scared, self-critical or self-conscious, accessing pleasure of any kind becomes much more challenging.

We are living at a time in history, where we are being confronted with an overwhelming amount of conflict, tragedy, injustice, and suffering; on top of the hardships in our personal lives.

Adversity is a natural part of life, it serves a purpose in helping us develop strengths and capacity to meet life’s challenges, but too much adversity overwhelms our systems. 

If we don’t get a chance to rest and digest the difficult moments in life, then we end up a bit shell-shocked and traumatized by it all, which seems to be a more common experience than not.

If you are regularly feeling anxious, numb, uninspired, lethargic, or are a bit compulsive about eating, social media, watching TV, or medicating with any kind of substance, chances are your system has not had a way to process the stress that life has dealt you.

So how do we take good care of ourselves 

in the face of so much adversity?… We allow ourselves more pleasure :)

Our ability to continue to thrive instead of shut down, when faced with adversity, is directly tied to our ability to receive pleasure. Let me define what I mean by pleasure, which is different from hedonism in my book.

Hedonism is the pursuit of pleasure to avoid pain, which can trap us in selfish behaviors and keep us from being with adversity which we need for our growth.

The kind of pleasure I’m talking about is holistic. It is in response to pain without avoiding it or pushing it away. 

The kind of pleasure I’m talking about is inspired by what your body needs to feel nourished, what it needs to relax and rest, what it needs to feel listened to and loved.

The kind of pleasure I’m talking about looks like a spontaneous dance party to your favorite song, looks like a hot bath with mineral salts and aromatherapy, it looks like a deeper breath, drinking in the blue sky, lingering in bed a little longer. And It looks like deeply enjoying these things as we receive them.

When we are in ‘go’ mode, when our survival feels threatened, when we are overwhelmed, we forget to find things we enjoy and give them to ourselves. 

We forget that our pleasure is the antidote to our suffering. We forget that pleasure can be simple, can be quick… but the real challenge is making it as important and habitual as brushing our teeth, our paying our bills.

Allowing ourselves to receive more pleasure sounds like a good idea right? So why don’t we do it more often?

We give our energy to the things and people we deem valuable, and too many of us do not count ourselves as one of those things, even though we can’t do much of anything without our well being.

These bodies are our most precious resource, it is literally what makes it possible for you to experience anything in the life, and it shapes how you are experiencing life… what could be more precious than that?

I invite you to prioritize holistic pleasure for yourself for one week. And see what happens? 

You can use my cheat sheet below for a super simple way to practice pleasure in 5 easy steps.

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1. CREATE THE SPACE FOR IT IN YOUR CALENDAR LIKE AN IMPORTANT DATE

Seriously, if pleasure doesn’t actually go on your to-do list, or your calendar, there is a good chance it ain’t going to happen. Make ‘pleasure dates’ where you schedule 30 mins up to 2 hours,  devoted to an enjoyable activity. Or set ‘pleasure reminders’ with an alarm to give yourself quick hits of pleasure like a few deep breaths, or close your eyes and say something ‘sweet’ to yourself internally.

2. WATCH THE IMPULSE TO FILL THE SPACE WITH OTHER ‘MORE IMPORTANT’ STUFF

When the time you have set aside arrives, don’t let other things get in the way. This can be a form of resistance, and frequently comes up until we are more comfortable creating time for pleasure. You’ll be amazed at how the world doesn’t fall apart if you put other things down for a moment, to give to yourself in this way. If you miss your date with pleasure, reschedule it! Don’t leave yourself hanging.

3. GIVE YOURSELF SOMETHING THAT FEELS GOOD

This may be harder to do than it sounds. Some of us can’t even access what would feel good to receive. I recommend taking a moment to check in with your body and see what it really needs. Often relieving tension is a good place to start, free-form movement, listening to something comforting, tuning into your breath.  Start simple and then keep exploring what your system enjoys that doesn’t numb, or harm you, or anyone else. I recommend starting a list and adding to it over time. Use this list for inspiration during your ‘pleasure dates’.

4. RECEIVE THE SENSATION INTO THE CORE OF YOUR BEING

Bravo if you get to the point of successfully giving yourself something enjoyable! To really maximize its impact and the potential medicine of the moment, get really present. Tune into what feels good in your body as you receive pleasure. What do pleasurable sensations feel like? Describe them for yourself as you feel them (ie: sparkles in my chest, warmth in my belly, etc.) As you locate each pleasurable sensation, imagine sipping it into your bones like a sponge soaking up water.

5. WATCH THE IMPULSE TO GIVE AWAY, WHAT YOU JUST GAVE YOURSELF.

When we start to give ourselves more pleasure, we feel better, we are more energized, there is literally more of us to give. Watch the desire to give away, what you have just given yourself. See you if you can enjoy the feeling in your body without having to spend it right away. Ways we will often do this is to talk more, to give affection to people around us as touch or compliments, to be super active until we are spent again. Some sharing of your good feeling is great, and part of why a pleasure practice benefits everyone. But watch the impulses to give all the goodness away, this is often a way we reduce ourselves back to a state of depletion that is more familiar.




If you enjoyed this and what more, you can also join me in person at The LA Times Festival of Books this coming Sat. April 13th., where I will be offering a somatic storytelling experience with my pleasure seeking companion Brittany Ballard. It’s a free event where we’ll be exploring this topic live.

photo credit: miguel bruna

photo credit: miguel bruna

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