“Pleasure your way to health?” Stephanie responded with skepticism in her eyes when I told her I run a wellness center with pleasure as its central tenet. “You’ve got to be kidding. It’s pleasure that got me into trouble in the first place!”

I met her retort peacefully, as I understood exactly where she was coming from. I personally remembered the many years during which I wondered why life was so darn cruel as to make the foods that gave me the most pleasure-cheese, chocolate, and dessert-the same ones that also led me to having pimples and gaining weight!

It seemed that “pleasure” always came along with undesirable consequences.

Whatever pleasure I had, I felt a strong urge to keep it “under wraps.” I instinctually sensed that, in my family, “pleasure” was not a topic that was to be spoken of aloud.

I learned to keep my pleasures secret. My main “offender” was how I indulged in food. Eating was pleasure for me, and soon overeating became my pleasure outlet of choice.
I felt guilty about all of this, and preferred to eat alone to avoid being seen. I “hid my tracks” as much as possible. Guilt was pleasure’s constant companion in my world.

I came to associate pleasure with not trusting myself. I came to associate pleasure with guilt and shame. I ultimately came to see pleasure as “sleeping with the enemy,” an enemy that had caused me to become twenty pounds overweight.

I was a prime candidate for writing pleasure off as a bad thing, when fortunately, during my quest to overcome my overeating, I came to a major revelation. I realized that, while I thought I was just craving food, what I was really craving was pleasure.

The more I studied the topic, the more I realized that the body, like all other animal, actually needs pleasure to function at its best. In other words, your body is an animal that biologically requires a certain quota of pleasure to be fully healthy and fully happy. No matter how much you resist it, there’s a force of nature in your body that will compel you to seek you need.

But before your mind becomes clouded with suspicion, it’s vital to remember that your attraction to pleasure, in its many diverse forms, is natural and above all, innocent.

Sadly, in our culture, the “naturalness” and “innocence” of pleasure is not pointed out to us at a young age. Instead it’s concealed, and all too often we’re brainwashed into believing that the opposite is true, that pleasure is devious and crooked.

By adulthood, a few of us have managed to work it out for ourselves though trial and error. But most of us still have “issues” around pleasure, which can stay with us through out our lives if we don’t do something about it.

It’s high time we changed that, and made education about pleasure accessible to all.

Here’s why. Because without the proper education to fully understand this over-powering force called pleasure, both its importance in evolution, and its potential benefits to you in your daily life, this misunderstood impulse can be a path to suffering, as it was for me for years.

The urge for pleasure will always get expressed; it is unstoppable. Your only choice is whether it gets expressed in a conscious, positive, affirming way, or a hidden, shame-based, destructive way.

Without consciously cultivating the skill of invoking pleasure into your life in a deliberate way, it’s likely that your urge for pleasure will be funneled into whichever pleasure is easiest for you to get your hands on, which for so many of us, is ever-accessible, ever-available food, particularly in its most junk-laden, denatured variety.

As a result, food ends up seeming to millions of people to be the source of their “problems.” For others, it’s alcohol, cigarettes, email-checking, work-work-work, shopping, or being on-the-go busy all the time. But in reality, these are just symptoms. They are the smoke, not the fire.

At the root of them all is the same thing: the body’s call for pleasure, which is not being respected or heeded with consciousness or care.

When I finally got hip to this, instead of trying to “discipline myself to eat less,” a proven-to-fail strategy if ever I’ve seen one, I began deliberately adding pleasure to my life. Dancing. Girl-time. Unrushed meals. Hot baths. Massages. Dressing up. Slowing down.

At that point, everything changed.

The more I investigated my true desires-in other words, the more I researched what truly gave me pleasure-my previously “out-of-control” behavior around food, simply fell away. Where there had been obsession, there was finally peace. All thanks to pleasure.

I eventually embraced pleasure full-heartedly. I unshackled myself from the guilt and shame I felt around enjoying food and I let myself enjoy it. Fully.

I let myself believe that what I wanted was right for me. After decades of second guessing my desires, this was a revolutionary act.

Trusting that my desires were right, however, required me to actually pay attention to what I actually wanted, rather than looking to an external source to tell me what I “should” want.
Now, based upon many my years of pleasure research, I’ve put together a guide of the top three ways you can get started and investigate pleasure in your life right now.

Rest assured, no matter how late you get on board, it’s never too late to learn about pleasure. Even if you currently feel like a relative stranger to pleasure, you can soon get the hang of it, because you’re body has been “in the know” all along.

Even if you’re as skeptical as Stephanie-who thought pleasure was a “trouble-maker” in her life, not the “helper” she now knows it to be-I invite you to experiment for yourself. Because the rewards that await you by putting this into practice may blow your mind.

To get you started, here are three surefire ways to open the gates of pleasure inspiration for yourself.

1. Find High-Quality Parties

Since time began, humans have been gathering together to celebrate. And to this day, attending a high-quality party still rates as one of the most pleasurable things you can do.
You’re probably not familiar with my distinction of a “high-quality” party vs. a “low-quality” party. Let me explain. . .

You know a “low-quality” party when you see one. Everyone seems to be there to “get something” from everyone else, whether it’s attention, favors, networking, or a hook-up. People are involved in various status games and competitions with each other.

Whereas by contrast, at a high-quality party, the opposite is true: everyone seems to be there to “give something” to everyone else: appreciation, attention, presence, energy, smiles, affection, warmth, friendship, listening, play, artistry.

At a great party, you can lose yourself, not only in conversation, but on the dance floor, in surrender to the music and the rhythms within your body. Following the beat, you can go on a journey, outside the bounds of your rational mind, to a place where unchartered pleasures lie.

A high-quality dance floor is a safe place for communal ecstasy, bodies harmonizing with the music in their own unique way. It’s a birth-place of community, another delicious component of high-quality parties.

If you’d like a recommendation, a favorite party of mine in New York is called “Get Your Dance On.” To hear about the next one, find out more here www.getyourdanceon.tumblr.com. They’ve managed to create an incredible atmosphere, with a vibe that is conscious and spiritually-oriented, without being preachy, and drawing in a crowd that is appealing and exciting, without being pretentious or inaccessible.

In this environment, something magical emerges: community, tribe, celebration, and one of the greatest pleasures of all, the sense of belonging.

2. Take Time For Sensual Exploration

If you’re in such a rush that sensuality has fallen through the cracks of your busy schedule, you’re surely not alone in New York City!

For example, for many over-worked New Yorkers, even sex becomes a chore they fit into their schedule, like doing the laundry or grocery shopping, and love-making ceases to be the playground for sensual exploration it has the potential to be.

Sensuality feeds on time. As one of my teachers says, “pleasure lives in the slow.” To start experiencing more sensuality, all you need to do is give yourself a little time to explore, and allow your curiosity to do the rest.

Before you object: Yes, I know you’re busy. So am I. Which is why a said a “little” bit of time. And remember sensuality relates to so much more than sex.

For example lingering for an extra 45 seconds at the window, to take in the beautiful formation of the clouds with your sense of sight. Or pausing an extra moment to give someone a meaningful hug that puts them at ease through your touch. Or shutting out all of the rest of the world, and engulfing yourself in a piece of music that stirs body and soul to heights of bliss.
All of these are time-efficient, cost-efficient, so-simple-anyone-can-do-them, means of sensual exploration.

But why stop there?

Learning to exchange massages with a friend is one of my top recommendations for experiencing the sensual. Offer a friend a back rub and you might just find you’ll be offered one in return, if not by them, then from someone else. You’ll also notice that giving a massage can be as sensually fulfilling and as pleasurable as getting one.

In your daily life, explore simply a stroll down the sidewalk with your attention on the sensual; or reassess your wardrobe with attention to what makes you feel your most in touch with your senses; or redesign your bedroom as your sensual haven, with mood lighting, color and texture. Your options are endless, because pleasure can be found (and taken) anywhere.
As a further benefit, sensual exploration is a pleasure that keeps on giving and giving. Once you are awakened to your senses, you’ll notice all the more, that pleasure and sensual delight that have been at your finger tips all along.

3. Turn Food From Chore Into Pleasure

Lastly, the simple act of feeding your body, which for many is a responsibility they’d rather do without, is a vastly untapped source of pleasure. For many people, if they could just take a “food pill” and be done with it, they would.

But that’s precisely the attitude that leads to weight gain.

Food’s correct place in your life, just like sex or a good conversation, is as something that nourishes you, not just a method for stuffing nutrients into your body.

Think about it: when you eat food, it literally becomes the building blocks that make up your actual body-the ultimate act of intimacy!

Now you might be saying, “Jena, I get plenty of pleasure from food, actually now that you mention it, maybe a little too much. Heehee…”

To which I would reply, “don’t worry,” there’s no such thing as too much pleasure with food. And if you struggle with food cravings, your problem is not too much pleasure, it’s not enough pleasure.

If you are scratching your head in confusion, let me explain.

To truly experience pleasure, in any setting, including food, you must be present. In the case of food, being present means you can actually see the food, taste the food, smell the food, and feel it enter your body right down to your stomach, not just in your mouth.

When you make a point of bringing all your senses to the table when you eat, the pleasure that’s available to you becomes exponentially greater than if you were to eat by quickly inhaling your food in a fast, breathless gulp. In fact, when you gulp down your food without presence, you must each much more food, and much more junky food, just to feel the pleasure your body craves.

Though your mind may seem able to move a mile a minute, your body, or as I like to call it, your animal, favors a slower pace. If you eat too fast for your body to extract pleasure from what you’re eating, you’ll find yourself compelled to eat more, due to your body’s built-in requirement that it experience the sensation of pleasure. Eating with guilt has the same effect. Whereas if you pay attention to seeking the pleasure upfront, you’ll be satisfied more quickly and in the end will eat less.

Geneen Roth sums up this concept beautifully. Contrary to popular beliefs about over-eating, she says, “it is when pleasure ends that over-eating begins.”

So allow food to nourish you. Slow down and be present to what you are putting in your mouth. Furthermore, take time for sensual exploration, in any and every realm of life. And always make time for a high-quality party. Speaking of which- next time you hear of one, please invite me!