Wednesday, January 19, 2022

Pleasure

 Tonight I hung out, ate popcorn and watched a movie. I really enjoyed the movie and being with myself. Sometimes it is challenging for me to spend time doing things that seem frivolous or with out purpose.

This year I have the intention to open to pleasure. Pleasure kind of scares me. I feel so out of control.

As long as I am practicing  all of my disciplines and being the queen of self care my life feels manageable.

I think for some people, who tend more toward inactivity, more discipline is a worthy intention. For me I notice sometimes that doing all of my disciplines every day can get kind of compulsive and even tyrannical. I miss out on the sweetness of life.  My new discipline is to be more spontaneous.

This week several activities I usually do haven’t worked out. I have had more time to do whatever I want and to even see what that is. What if playing solitaire isn’t a moral crime?

Tomorrow morning the yoga class I usually attend got changed to virtual because of Covid. This class doesn’t really work for me to do virtually with my hearing challenges. I have a lot of options. I don’t work until 1:00. Usually I would plan out the morning tonight. Instead my plan is to wake up and see what I feel like doing. What if I want to sleep in instead of doing yoga and meditation? What if I want to eat when I’m hungry and not let my intermittent fasting window decide when I eat? What if enjoying myself is my new frontier? 

It’s not like there is no pleasure in my life. Rather it is not what I have focused on. I have focused on growing and learning and I have grown and learned a lot. I think it is time now to begin to shift my focus to include exploring what feels good to me rather than what is missing in myself and in my life.

I feel excited. What if I let go of my usual all or nothing MO and began to explore what feels good in the midst of practicing my disciplines? What if what changed was the idea that I need to keep active and always doing something to be OK? What if embracing slowing down would give me a chance to better accept myself and my life as it is and to be curious. 

Ah, curiosity. What if I could be more often curious and less often  judgemental? What if curiosity would open my heart? What if I could even be curious about being judgemental? What if Self-Compassion involved asking ,what’s this like for me? instead of Why? 

There are a lot of sad and scary things happening in the world right now. The climate emergency is looming, Our political system seems to be stagnated with partisan politics. Hateful things are happening every day. Covid 19 is rapidly spreading right now. All of this is true and its easy to meet it all with despair and  numbness.

Somehow focusing on pleasure seems even more important right now, in the midst of these very challenging times. If I am aware of when I am enjoying myself I have more access to being present with what I am doing. Being more present allows me to think more clearly and have better access to all of my feelings. Better access to all of my feelings and clearer thinking allows me to feel more alive. Feeling more alive allows me to let go of going through the motions and doing things to get them over with so I can  move on to the next thing. I want to practice savoring moments more.

My adventure is deeper awareness and taking the time to notice what  feels good and what doesn’t and giving myself the option to chose differently or continue.

Right now, I am done writing. Thank you for listening. What role does pleasure play in your life?

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