The most important thing I learned in 2016
The most important thing I learned in 2016
I’m noticing this pleasure quest I’m on, is changing me. As I reflected back on 2016 and look forward to this 2017, the most notable difference is that pleasure has taken a firm hold in my life.
What I’ve learned is that pleasure is a powerful change agent. When I embrace it as a guiding principle, it has the capacity to deeply transform.
I started the pleasure project in 2015. When the inspiration for this theme came to me I had little idea really what I was taking on. Like a true creative venture I’m on a journey now with pleasure. Two years in pleasure is established as the priority and in the process I’ve discovered what I call the keys to pleasure.
If an outside observer were to have a glance into my world, perhaps it wouldn’t be so obvious because as I frequently comment “Pleasure is an inside affair”. It’s a state of being rather than a rooster of doing.
What’s the effect? It’s easier to make choices based on what’s really important to me – the pace, the activity, and most importantly, the spaciousness. In the art of pleasure for me slow is fast and less is more. This is one of the keys!
I notice I laugh more and feel more relaxed. I feel lighter about even the heavier issues of life. I’m more selective in how I use my time and energy. I place a high value on my own agenda versus the demands of the clock, the calendar, or other people. It’s become a doorway into a truer version of myself.
Pleasure is one of our essential motivators. I’d even go as far to say its part of the survival instinct - that’s why we’re all so curious about it. But I offer we’ve got some mistaken notions about it. The most important thing I’ve learned is that if I let pleasure be my guide, if I really pay attention to its unique meaning for me, then it nourishes and grounds me. It becomes a source in itself of well-being and resiliency.
But pleasure means different things to each of us. So you must find your own unique expression of it, to allow pleasure to guide you. And when you do things will change – most likely inside first, but then in time, also outside of you, in the way you show up and how the world responds to you.
But first – what is the unique expression of pleasure for you? This is a key question that must be discerned first.
I hope you will let pleasure be your muse in 2017 and please let me know what happens next?
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