Guilt for Pleasure

[NoelFigart]

I'm not even sure this is off-topic, but I wasn't sure where to put it, and figure there's no harm here.

I've been noticing a trend I find a little distressing -- a certain... pride in not taking pleasure in things typically found pleasurable.

Don't get me wrong. I knew a man who genuinely did not LIKE ice cream. I recognize tastes differ. What I find a little sad, though, is that people are feeling guilty for enjoying their food and the like.

Now certainly hedonism can be taken way too far. But I see very few honestly hedonistic people. I see rebellious people, I see angrily self-indulgent people (which is no genuine indulgence at all). What I don't see as often is people who choose to savor life. They're not thin enough, rich enough, whatever, to actually take a moment and order their lives and habits to truly savor the good things in life.

Treating a meal as an event, ferinstance -- dining rather than feeding. Candles are cheap. So is plain white dinnerware from the dollar store. You can set a table that is BEAUTIFUL with very little money, but yet we associate dining rituals with the wealthy. Sauce onnna carb can be lovely on plain dinnerware by candlelight.

We do it with other things, too. Exercise should be punishing, or we don't take the trouble to order our surroundings to be visually restful.

I think we, as a culture, are less "self-indulgent" and more scattered, spazzed and turn everything up to eleven. Which brings us around to Reinhard's idea of moderation being a good thing!

What's more TRULY self-indulgent, a box of pizza while reading a book in a room cluttered with things you don't need wearing a torn sweatshirt, or a lovely cup of tea in an elegantly sparse room while curled up in silky jammies and enjoying that same book?

What's more genuinely self-indulgent -- Ben and Jerry's from the carton standing at the fridge, or a pretty cut glass bowl of the same ice cream sitting at a table and listening to some really good music?

It's early and this is hardly a well-developed essay, but it's something I often think about. I think that what we call being self-indulgent isn't and that we should savor our pleasures better.



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[wosnes]

I think I understand what you're saying; just admitting that you enjoy pizza or Ben and Jerry's is supposed to make you feel guilty. We've edited pleasure out of eating, not to mention other activities. It's as if there's something wrong with stopping and savoring the pleasures of life.

[amake616]

I think what you're describing is just some people's compulsion to feel superior to others for some reason, any reason. After all, why should anyone else care if you (or anyone else) eats their ice cream out of a pretty bowl? It's not hurting anyone so why make a hard judgment on it? You see it with people who have dieted successfully on some Internet boards who chastise people for liking dessert becuse they've "gotten past that" or rich people who look down on the nouveau riche for having no class and the nouveau riche looking down on the old money for being lazy and entitled. Women who don't like to wear makeup judging other women who do harshly and women who breastfeed their children judging women who fomula-feed as not being "as committed" to their children. There's a million variations and it all boils down to needing to criticize others to build yourself up.

[NoelFigart]

No... No....

Not my point at all. Sorry I got it wrong.

[amake616]

No... No....

Not my point at all. Sorry I got it wrong.

lol, you might have got it just right and I (or we) didn't read it as you meant it. Fine nuance can get lost from one screen to another.

[Blithe Morning]

Perhaps it's the Wal-Martification of our lives. Cheap and easy is the modus operandi.