My Confession

I am a healing junkie in recovery!

My addiction had been longstanding for about 10 years. I craved moving through my emotions, learning more, doing constant healing work, throwing myself into the next challenge, being triggered and growing. Transformation was my thing and I was good at it.

Once, an energy work practitioner told me that I am like a strong yellow diamond that throws itself onto the toughest surfaces just to see what I’m made of. And it’s true that I get a high from this. I expand and grow; I become stronger and more powerful.

I enjoy all of this and I know myself more deeply. What I want, who I truly am (not all of the beliefs I hold, but the divine consciousness), and the possibilities of who I can be.

Do you notice something like this for yourself where you're drawn to looking at the problems, solving things, or healing? When we finally get to a good or pleasurable feeling, we often skip to the next thing on our list, the next challenge.

Moving too fast away from pleasure sends a message to our bodies that we don't actually want to feel pleasure. 

We must practice pleasure if we want to feel pleasure.

 

Why Practice Feeling Pleasure?

Through studies in Yoga and years of EMDR (Eye Movement, Desensitization and Reprocessing) Therapy, I had an inkling that it was helpful to rest and feel pleasure. It was good to feel good. Ha! What an idea.

After all, what was all that healing for? I want to feel pleasure, goodness, expansion, spaciousness, alive, right? Didn’t I want to be feeling all the good stuff?

In EMDR Therapy, learned to resource pleasant experiences and it wonderfully helped them instill in my body memory and feel more powerful in me. I could recall the specific ones I had worked on and feel them easily.

Yoga philosophy taught me the balance of effortlessness and ease in the application of Yoga Sutra II.46:

थिरसुखमासनम् ॥४६॥
sthira-sukham-asanam

This means that the essential way to integrate and perfect asana, yoga poses, (as well as life action) is to balance ease, effortlessness, and rest, with effort, steadiness, and strength.

When I trained in SE, Somatic Experiencing, the importance of resting and feeling pleasure was that much more evident.

Rest provides your body the chance to integrate, your energetic channels to recalibrate, and your heart and soul to marinate in a new feeling or growth. Feeling into pleasure helps one to feel comfortable and safe in it, feel more of it, enhance our receptors for it.

The knowledge of SE brings the understanding of the nervous system’s safety as the number one factor behind feeling pleasure or not. Generally, if you have a healthy nervous system, your body instinctually doesn’t allow pleasure to be had when you’re in a fear mode, or fight and flight, since your energies would be directed towards protection and safety.

Because you (or someone in your ancestry) may have had overwhelming or fearful experiences that are incomplete (car accidents, abuse, an upsetting situation, natural disaster, relational trauma, etc.), your nervous system may still be in fight, flight, or freeze (tonic immobility) modes, making it challenging or unsafe to feel true pleasure and rest.

Also, there is an unspoken societal myth that pleasure only has to do with sex. Pleasure is a much broader experience in all of life and not only generated in sexual intimacy.

The Tricky Thing About Pleasure

For me, consciously not go to the hard stuff and allowing myself to feel the good stuff was not that easy at first. This seems to be the truth for many people.

I realized that on a spiritual level, it was hard for me to allow pleasure because I was living from distorted and limiting beliefs that I wasn’t enough, that I had to heal every limiting belief, and that I wasn’t worthy of or allowed to have pleasure or joy.

On an earthly level, I had to face the origins of where this came from in my childhood and ancestry. I looked at the pain of the poverty that was felt – the beliefs and ways of being that I inherited because of that, the loyalties I had to my family’s pain.

The Biology Behind Access to Pleasure

Somatic Experiencing (SE) gives a clear way to understand what happens with pleasure or rest. When you feel pleasure, rest or calm, you may be in what SE calls the “Healing Vortex.” When we deepen and expand this way, the “Trauma Vortex” can also be activated. This is because your nervous system will want to naturally pendulate, move towards more growth, and expand its capacity. Therefore, if you are feeling good or restful, sometimes challenging emotions or overwhelming experiences can emerge. A simple way to understand it is that your capacity to feel everything begins to expand when you feel into pleasure.

Think about when you’ve received a compliment, praise, or loving attention from someone. It can be challenging! It can take practice to receive a good feeling and stay in it.

Practicing Pleasure Now

While you chip away at healing the limiting beliefs that might support you  in feeling pleasure organically, you can begin to practice pleasure now. You don’t have to wait to feel pleasure!

Three Ways to Lean into Pleasure

Resourcing Pleasure

• Ask yourself, what brings a feeling of safety, goodness, or pleasure? Feel free to choose an object from your surroundings, nature, a memory, or a person, animal, or spiritual figure.
• Bring a picture to your mind of what you’ve selected or look at the real thing.
• Become aware of all the details about your selected pleasant thing from all of the five senses: sounds, touch, taste, smell, sight.
• Notice what feelings, emotions, sensations, and impulses or body movements come with it.
• Allow yourself to bask in the pleasant sensations and emotions around it for as long as it feels comfortable. Feel free to pendulate by taking a break or shifting gears to something else if it becomes overwhelming or you other emotions emerge.

Attuning to Pleasure

• Notice 3 things in the present moment that are pleasant. This can include a neutral or pleasant feeling in the body, something you are drinking or eating, a sound you hear, a person nearby, something you are grateful for, etc.
• Notice the feelings, emotions, sensations, and impulses or body movements that come with it.
• Allow yourself to soak in the pleasant sensations and emotions around it.

Moving with Pleasure

• Put 5 minutes on a timer
• Feel downward and into your body
• Let your body guide the way and sense what movement it wants
• Give yourself permission to move freely without judgment
• Explore the movement (or lack of) that feels pleasant
• Notice the feelings and sensations in the body without thinking about them

Feeling Good In the Presence of Someone

I had good support from therapists and healers to guide me into the subtleties of feeling pleasure and rest. It can make a world of a difference to allow yourself to feel good while someone is compassionately and patiently supporting. It can also help to fill in what my have been missing developmentally, if you’ve had any disruptions or challenges in your bond with your parents or caretakers, as we need to feel that we can co-regulate with a grounded caretaker, rest openly, and feel good and share it.

Go ahead and give yourself permission to feel pleasure! Feel free to reach out for support in feeling pleasure and goodness, or in what comes up around it.

I offer healing sessions and the benefits of sitting in pleasure have been immensely powerful for my clients.