Principle 6 Pleasure – Week 1 – 2024
June 1, 2024
Principle 6. Pleasure. First Week
“If you pursue pleasure, you enchain yourself to suffering. But as long as you do not harm your health, enjoy without inhibition when the opportunity presents itself.”
Last time: The Illusion That Things Don’t Change
This Time: How to Have Your Cake (or Ask About It) and Eat It Too.
This Week:
Over the next weeks we will look at various aspects of the principle of pleasure. This week will consider its general meaning, and broad implications. We’ll also consider some observations about, and illustrations of, the principle of pleasure in general. At our next meeting we will discuss our observations, thoughts, and questions about it.
To help gain some new perspectives we will also play the game of Find It!
To get that started I’ve included some stories, quotes, and pictures that we previously found in the Flotsam and Jetsam of our culture, and which perhaps illustrate something of that principle. I’ll add to those each week.
Here’s one, our story this week is another, Rafa's illustration is another:
Most men pursue pleasure with such breathless haste that they hurry past it.
Kierkregard - Either/Or (1843)
Here’s some ideas to consider this week. We can discuss your questions, insights, and discoveries in our next meeting.
General Considerations and Personal Reflections:
A Story:
Here is an unusual tale that may help to illustrate this Principle:
The master of a monastery was forced to suddenly leave on an arduous but important journey. Before her departure she presented her assembled disciples with a magic cake. Among its virtues was the power to provide all the nutrition one required. The master told them that it had even more amazing abilities since each disciple could eat as much of this extraordinary pastry as they wanted and yet the cake would in no way be diminished. The only condition was that they had to promise to eat some cake only once a day.
One disciple cut off some and put it on a plate. Taking a bite, he was astonished by its delicious flavour and gobbled up the entire piece. He was barely finished when he began imagining tomorrow’s portion. Each day he finished his share even more obsessed with the cake than the day before. Finally, he decided to put an end to the problem by eating enough that he would be satisfied until his next turn. So, he ate an enormous piece – so much so that he fell ill with such terrible indigestion that it brought him to the brink of death.
In remembrance of this a plaque was affixed to the monastery gate. It read: “They suffer who seek and desire to conserve.”
Another disciple seeing what had happened did not even want to try the cake, even though he desired almost nothing as much as he desired to taste it. But he thought to himself: “as we have seen, pleasure brings pain. Therefore, better not to enjoy so as not to suffer later. As we have seen, one thing leads to another.”
So it happened that this ascetic monk thought all day long of cake, he dreamt of mountains of cake but could not take a bite. One day, unable to bear it any longer he tasted the marvelous cake. In this way he betrayed his convictions and did not decrease his obsession in the least.
In front of the monastery, they placed another plaque. This one said: “The sin is not in the cake nor in the belly. It is in what is dreamt and imagined by the mind.”
Finally, a third disciple asked about the tasks that the master had entrusted them with before she left. she saw that the monastery, and its farm with its fields and animals had been left untended. Making things even more complicated the diversity of opinions regarding the cake had divided the community. There was much to do so she made herself responsible to get things in order before the master’s return. One day while cleaning she came to one of the rooms where she stumbled across the source of so much argument, the magic cake. Being hungry she cut herself a fair-sized piece and slowly savoured its wonderful taste. But there was so much to do she soon forgot all about it as she went about his tasks.
When the master returned, she saw the two plaques at the monastery gate and asked what they meant. Hearing about the chaos and problems her cake had instigated she had it removed. Later however she said, “a great injustice has been done” and she had a third plaque erected. It read: “The excess of a strong fool and the asceticism of a weak scholar lead to the same end. But what creates so many problems for the greedy and fearful is just a morsel for a saint.
To Do List
-This week we turn our attention to trying to apply the Principle of Pleasure.
- Consider this principle in terms of what you think, or hope, or fear your future holds.
-Play the game of Explain It!
You can find the rules for the game below.
Remember
Learn to resist the violence that is within you and outside of you.
Learn to recognize the signs of the sacred within you and around you.
The Path _ Silo
Worth Repeating:
Whenever you find great strength, joy, and kindness in your heart, or when you feel free and without contradictions, immediately be internally thankful. When you find yourself in opposite circumstances, ask with faith, and the gratitude you have accumulated will return to you transformed and amplified in benefit.
The Inner Look, chapter 13 _ Silo
Coming up:
Next week we’ll continue with the Principle 6, also known as the principle of pleasure. We will be focusing on how this principle might have impacted past situations.
Note:
These notes have been posted on Facebook and sent to our email list, and, on my website www.dzuckerbrot.com
More to Come
The Game of the Week.
Find It!
The rules for week’s game are simple, and summed up in the name of the game, Find it! We are always looking for examples of the principles in our daily life and personal experience. In the game of Find It! we extend that to the cultural environment around us.
This week’s story, quotes, images might be considered as examples of what someone playing this game found. During this week keep your eyes and ears (and memory and imagination) open for things around you that illustrate the principle.
Remember:
“Here are joy, love of the body, of nature, of humanity, and of the spirit.”
Silo_ The Inner Look I:II
Worth Repeating:
“If you are not indifferent to the pain and suffering of others, in order to help them you must bring your thoughts, feelings, and actions into agreement.”
Silo_ The Path
Coming up:
The Principle Applied to the Present and The Game of Ask About It!
Note:
These notes have been posted on Facebook and sent to our email list, and, on my website www.dzuckerbrot.com
Here’s somethings to consider this week. Our next meeting will be a chance for an interchange about your thoughts, insights, examples and questions.
You’ll receive a reminder the day before the meeting. We hope you can join us.
And then…