Pleasure Is a practice-This one simple shift can instantly improve your life

You may be privy to the importance of wiring your brain to believe that your desired outcomes in life are possible in order to attract what you want. From a neuroscience stand point this is absolutely true and profound when you put it into practice! Research also shows that excavating through the muck of the hard feelings and aspects of ourselves we don’t want to face, is a powerful way to get clear on what may be blocking us in order to manifest a more favourable reality. It’s the hard, uncomfortable feelings that like to lurk and gnaw at us relentlessly until we do the work and deal with them.

They’re most often accompanied by invasive thoughts that live in our head rent free. They’re loud, proud, and don’t like to let go, so it’s easy to know what feels like shit and what we don’t want. But how often do we really allow ourselves to slow down and let ourselves actually register the feel good sensations that occur in the body when we are experiencing joy, excitement, love, heart swelling endearment or affinity. We are really good at striving for what we do want, as a future concept in our mind-something “over there” to move towards. It’s so easy to rush right over the fleeting positive feelings when we reach a goal or get something once hoped for and think “Okay great! now what’s next,” without even really dropping in.

Because unlike the crappy feelings that like to cling to us like an octopus, those good feels unfortunately don’t seem to be as obsessed with us (rude.) Future fantasizing can also be so intoxicating and often our thoughts about our wants and dreams feel even more arousing than reality itself, even if the present moment is something we once dreamed of. If we don’t pay close attention to our body’s whispers and messages (which come through by way of sensations and feelings) we won’t even recognize the good things when they come, let alone really revel in the immense pleasure available within the experience.

Re-wiring of the brain is all about the subconscious mind and… fun fact about the unconscious mind-It lives in the body! The more we can get in the habit of embodying pleasure in even the smallest moments we are training our brains to not only recognize pleasure opportunities, but also getting our bodies on board to slow down and FEEL the experience rather than just being a spectator and taking note.

Our brains love negativity bias by default, so consciously embodying and feeling pleasure as often as possible will start to re-wire our subconscious mind and we will begin to see life through a default lens of pleasure, optimism, beauty and appreciation with less resistance and pretty soon those whispers will become louder and we can expand our capacity to allow pleasure in. And what’s really cool about getting intimately acquainted with all of the things that feel good to you on the regular, is it makes what is a “no” for you, so much more obvious because it’s something you can feel in contrast and you can let your brain off the hook for a change! How about that for a life hack?

With this M.O you can come to the end of what may look like a rather uneventful day on paper, and be able to say, “Today felt good” rather than “Today was boring and nothing that great happened.” Look at that! You’re already well on your way to a better life.

Pleasure is a practice. You deserve it. Look for it. Invite it in. Slow down. Allow it to register. Let it stay a little longer. Repeat. xx