Pleasure is a tricky word. Maybe “sticky” is a better description because it attracts all the cautions our culture has about the sensory. Pleasure often is associated with sensuous, and that notion has all kinds of associations that our culture has hijacked both positively and negatively.
For me, pleasure is all about delight and joy in living. In one way, it minimally gives me a relaxed refuge from all the fears that confront me in my dreams and throughout my day. By relaxing into the yielding embrace of all that causes me fear, I am able to metabolize what otherwise would cause anxiety. By allowing myself to fall into the endless darkness of what threatens me and summons fear, I experience the calm thrill of soaring flight.
But there is so much more offered by pleasure. In so many ways, pleasure invites me into the delight of the rich experiences that awaite me throughout the day. Most of those experiences are founded in the senses. I walk through my morning garden and touch the grass, brush up against plants, look all around at all that is alive. I enjoy the deep pleasure of the bright awareness that surges through me. I stare at the dahlia in a vase on my table. I hug a friend and linger in the soft feel of their presence. My pleasureful day is sometimes punctuated by gently touching the butt of my sweetie. My contact with my world is flowing with pleasure, and my presence is repeatedly filled with joy.
I mostly try to do only those things that give me pleasure. I garden in a manner that gives me the joy of gardening. I tell friends routinely that if something about gardening is not giving you joy, it is only yard work. I may be sad about the loss of a favorite plant, but I am also embracing that it has done what it has chosen to do. My joy is in seeing it be the kind of plant that it is.
I practice joy by meditating. For me, meditation is not a burdensome, rigorout task. It is an opportunity to plunge into the pleasure of a quiet mind, to soar into the realm of formless perception. The experience may only last for a moment, but the warm, relaxed glow lingers. I often stop throughout the day when my bell rings on each hour. I touch something and feel the pleasure of touch throughout my body. My body has learned to respond from the top of my head to the bottom of my feet no matter how I am connected to my world. I am charged with the pleasure of the moment.
My days are filled with pleasureful moments. My body feels the presence of the plants in my garden, the clerk in the checkout lane, the friend stopping by to say hello. I know that pleasure is a tricky word, but it is all mine to own. After all, I have embraced the role of trickster. I choose to be full of pleasure and to share it.