The Search Continues
Human beings are pleasure seekers. The reason there are books is because we are pleasure seekers. A writer seeks that book that brings her the most pleasure as she writes it, and a reader scours the bookshelf for a story that will bring him the most pleasure as he reads it. The search for pleasure never ends. I believe that it’s what we are made of. Yet it is this very search for pleasure that has landed me in so much trouble. The drugs and the bad sex; the jobs taken just for the money; the second dish of ice cream; the shoes I couldn’t afford. I must become disciplined. I must seek balance where before I sought pleasure.
But it never works. Even as I tell myself not to seek pleasure I peek at my own heart to see if there is pleasure in denying myself pleasure! What are those Buddhists doing up in the hills? I would meditate, but I can’t turn off my attention. My attention is eternally on, and my attention is always seeking one thing and one thing only—pleasure.
And then one day I was sitting in my backyard with my cat. It took me a moment, but I realized I was happy. I say this, because I understood somehow that I was not happy because I was petting my cat, or because it was sunny, or because I was in my backyard—I was simply happy because I existed. The happiness was attached to nothing whatsoever. It was simply there.
And then it was gone. I thought, “I must seek it again.” And like that, I understood. Now I knew what to do with my attention that could never turn off. Now that attention had a job. That attention must seek the happiness of nothing. That is happiness’s source.
It was good to know. Life has always felt like a search to me, and I have always been a bit like a dog that is never happy without a bone for which to dig. I’ve ruined a lot of yards in my efforts, but perhaps that is over now. So much of getting older is learning how to do something while you appear to be doing nothing.
If you like the ideas and perspectives expressed here, feel free to contact me about individual and group conferencing.
You can find Bill at: williamkenower.com
