The Treasure of Pleasure

Hi, and welcome to your Daily Mindfulness. Today, I'd like to talk about using moments of pleasure as a mindfulness practice. So this is important because some days from the moment we open our eyes, the mind leaps forward into our plans, our priorities, our problems, and our desires. And throughout the whole day, we can kind of dream walk through it all engrossed, in our tasks and duties. When we get caught up in all of our doing and thinking like this, it can be really easy to lose touch with the simple pleasures of life.

Recently, I took the time to sit in the morning sun with a cup of tea. I listened to the bird song. I watched in awe as the steam from my tea was unfurling in the golden morning light. I watched the color of the tea deepen over the minutes. And I slowly savored each sip, felt the warmth flowing down into my body, and I felt filled with this sense of tranquility and joy.

And then I got up, I started to walk back to the house to start my work day. And I noticed that as soon as I started heading that way, these thoughts came rushing in about all the tasks I had to do, my hopes, my worries, and my problems. So I paused again and I brought my attention back to the pleasure of the moment. I listened to the sounds all around me, the birds, the wind rustling in the trees. I felt the warmth of the sun on my skin.

And that sense of tranquility and joy returned. So I made an intention in that moment to keep pausing throughout the day and keep bringing my attention back to the pleasure of any given moment. And my day became punctuated with many moments of beauty, tranquility, calm, ease, and joy. And I still got everything done. I didn't lose any efficiency.

So I wanted to extend this invitation to you today. See if you can lean into the moments of pleasure in your life today. Do it as a mindfulness practice. Stop every now and then, and just bring your attention to what's there to be appreciated, savored. And it can be just the very simple things, you know.

It might be simply noticing that you're safe, that you have power and water, that you're not in pain, you're not hungry, there's no illness. It could also be enjoying certain music or sounds, enjoying nice food, the beauty of nature, connections with others. Whatever it is, I encourage you to lean into little moments of pleasure today and see what effect it has on you. You know, it's really easy to forget how incredibly fortunate we are. So today if you find yourself feeling a bit caught up in the rat race of life, you find yourself really kind of burdened by problems or exhausted, just hit the pause button for a moment.

Bring your attention out to what's pleasurable in the moment. When you turn towards those moments of pleasure, lightness, ease, and wonder come rushing back into our lives and into our being. So as always, thank you for your practice and enjoy this practice today. And now let's settle in for today's meditation.