V I D EO T R A N S C R I P T

STOP No 8P L E A S U R E I S L A N D

Lesson #1: True vs. False Pleasure

Video Transcript - Stop #8: Pleasure Islandslim, chic & savvy

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STOP No 8: PLEASURE ISLAND LESSON #1: TRUE VS. FALSE PLEASURE

When I went to Paris for the very first time, what became super obvious to me is that my life lacked true pleasure. Like so many women, I was overwhelmed. I was stressed out, and I thought I needed to do more in order to create change. I felt like I needed more willpower. When actually what I needed was more true pleasure.

Welcome to Stop Number 8 Pleasure Island, where you’re going to learn about the power of pleasure in your life. And in this very first lesson, we’re going to talk about true pleasure versus false pleasure. True pleasure is actually very healing to our bodies. In fact, scientists have studied what happens in our bodies when we’re in a state of pleasure. Things like our brain releases dopamine and serotonin, which feels good. Also, our cortisol levels go down. Cortisol is the hormone that’s released when we’re in a state of fight or flight, right?

So when we’re in pleasure, we’re less stressed. And guess what happens when we feel less stress? When we feel better? Well, as you’ve learned, we take better action in our lives, which is why I’m such an advocate of true pleasure. But you’ve probably noticed that I keep saying true pleasure. One of the things that I’ve noticed is that we sometimes mix up what is true pleasure versus false pleasure. For example, one of my clients that I just spoke with last week, we were talking about her eating. She wants to lose weight. And she was saying to me, she said, “Tonya, it just tastes so good to eat a lot of chocolate when I get home.”

Now let’s just take a look at that. In the moment, a little bit of chocolate tastes amazing. But at a certain point, it no longer brings you pleasure. It becomes what I call a false pleasure. So the way you know the difference between true pleasure and false pleasure is true pleasure is life giving. It’s something that feels expansive. It feels good. It typically has a compound effect. It is something that is usually intentional, and it leads you toward your sweet spot.

False pleasure, on the other hand, is usually life taking. It can create a lot of pain in your life. It is usually reactive. It’s you trying to get away from pain, and it takes you further away from your sweet spot. So, an example would be eating a delicious meal until you’re elegantly satisfied can bring you true pleasure. But when you eat more than your body needs, it can lead to a lot of pain. In fact, the philosopher Epictetus, I hope I got that right, he says that pleasure is the absence of pain.

So think of it this way. I have a really good friend, who, she finds it very painful to spend money. She is very frugal, so she’s on one end of the spectrum. I have another friend who loves to spend money. She spends a lot of it. So, both of them are in a state of pain when they are living in the extreme. When one is not allowing herself any... what’s a good way to say this? When she’s not allowing herself the ability to buy herself something beautiful or spend money on something that could really enhance her life, it’s painful. My other friend, on the other hand, when she’s overspending, and she’s going into a lot of debt, that’s equally painful. But if they could both find their sweet spot of where they’re spending just enough where they’re getting true pleasure, and it’s not taking them into pain, that’s when pleasure can be very healing.

Video Transcript - Stop #8: Pleasure Islandslim, chic & savvy

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So I know for me personally, pleasure really started to change my life and heal me in so many amazing ways when I stopped denying myself of pleasurable things. For many years, I got a lot of pleasure from food. In fact, when I ask my clients who struggle with weight, “How much of your pleasure comes from food?” many of them will say 90% or more. And because we are wired to follow pleasure and avoid pain, it makes sense why they are turning to food, because they want pleasure in their lives.

So when you don’t have diversified pleasure, and your pleasure’s coming from one thing, chances are it’s probably a very unhealthy behavior that you have established, whether it’s working too much or spending too much or eating too much. So for me, when I started just taking time out and doing things as simple as lighting a candle or wearing a beautiful perfume or buying a beautiful piece of chocolate and enjoying it, those little things started to make me feel better. And they weren’t sabotaging me. They were actually supporting me in amazing ways.

I also have to mention hot baths. To me, that’s like one of the most pleasurable things I can do for myself. So, as I started to really enjoy these simple pleasures, I found myself again feeling better and then showing up in my life better. But the other thing that really helped me create massive change in my life, really boils down to the pleasure pain principle. So, as I was just saying, we are wired as human beings to pursue pleasure and avoid pain. But when we have associated self-sabotaging behaviors with pleasure, we can create a lot of havoc in our lives. Equally, when we have associated things that will help us move forward with a lot of pain, we do the same.

So, an example would be sometimes I have clients that come to me, and they are in this pattern of procrastination. They know what they want to do. They know what would massively change their lives, but in that moment, they are choosing not to show up for their dream. Why? Because they’ve associated a lot of pain with taking action in the moment. But when they realize that they can actually associate pain with not taking action and pleasure with taking action, they begin to show up very differently. The same goes with food, and this is one that I personally struggled with a lot. I had a lot of pain around not eating. I was afraid of being deprived. And in the moment, we will always do what we think we need to do to avoid pain.

Again, it’s a way of our brain trying to keep us safe, keep us in the cave. They’re like, “Pain stay away. Avoid.” But the problem is when your brain is wired in a way that doesn’t support you. So for me personally, I had to begin to associate pain with overeating. I would imagine myself if I keep going down this path, I’m going to be extremely obese and very unhealthy. I started to imagine what life would be with my daughter if I don’t have the energy to play with her, and so when I would go to eat, I would think about all of the pain that it was going to incur. Now, granted it was uncomfortable, because when you’ve been doing something for a long time and you stop that behavior, you’re going to feel an immense amount of discomfort. But remember what we talked about in Stop Number 4, I think it was, about emotions. When you’re willing to feel all the emotions, when you’re willing to feel discomfort, there’s nothing you cannot create in your life.

And so I really had to sit with the pain of what my behavior was doing, and doing it from a place of non-judgment, of loving myself through the entire process. But then I started to associate pleasure with stopping eating. I remember pushing the plate away when I’d had enough, and associating so much pleasure with that. And for me the way I did that was I thought about how proud I would be of myself afterwards.

I remember becoming addicted to the feeling of being proud of myself, which is one of the most amazing feelings that you can have. And so over time, doing that process over and over again, what used to be extremely pleasurable

Video Transcript - Stop #8: Pleasure Islandslim, chic & savvy

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became extremely painful for me, which was overeating. But it took time. I’ll never forget sitting down with one of my French girlfriends, because we went to a café in Paris. We were chatting about food and the culture, and I said, “How do you not just eat all of the croissants? Like, how is that possible?” And she’s like, “Because it’s painful to be overweight.” And I was like, “Wow.” For her, she had associated a lot of pain with eating to the point that she gained weight.

Some people associate a lot of pain with depriving themselves of food. But when you use to learn the pleasure pain principle in your favor, it’s amazing what you can create in your life. Remember everything you do, everything you do in life, is because you’re trying to avoid pain and move towards pleasure. I mean, think about it. Why did I put on makeup for this video? Why do I enjoy getting dressed in the mornings? It’s because it’s very pleasurable for me.

Now for some people, they do the same thing, but for them it’s because they want to avoid pain. So maybe one woman puts on makeup in the morning because she doesn’t want to be rejected at work. It doesn’t matter. It’s the same principle. Everything you do is because you’re trying to move towards pleasure, and you’re trying to avoid pain.

So what I want you to think about is what in your life right now is a true pleasure? And remember true pleasures are anything that will move you towards your sweet spot. It has a compound effect. It is life giving, and it’s intentional. And then get honest with yourself about what is a false pleasure in your life. And that will be anything takes you away from your sweet spot. I have so many women that tell me how pleasurable it is to go through the drive through after a long day of work. And I’m like, “Really? That’s pleasurable?” They say to me, “Yeah, I deserve it.” I’m like, “You really think you deserve cheap fast food as a reward?” It’s like they have this light bulb moment of like, “Wow, I deserve so much more than that.” But they’ve linked extreme pleasure to this behavior and to think of not having it is painful.

But what if they rewired their brain that going through the drive through is actually really painful? It’s costing me a lot. It’s costing me my health. It’s costing me my confidence, my self-esteem. And then they tied extreme pleasure to instead going and getting something from the farmers’ market, or cooking themselves a very delicious, nutritional meal. When you begin to link pleasure to what you want to do in your life, and you start linking pain to not doing it, you’re going to find that you don’t need willpower. You really just need more true pleasure in your life.

Just another example that came to mind, because maybe you’re watching this and you are wanting to change careers. That’s just one example. And you link extreme pleasure to the idea of getting a new career, but you link extreme pain to rejection. You link extreme pain to potential humiliation, and therefore because you will always do what it takes to avoid pain, what is going to end up happening no matter how pleasurable the idea of having your dream career is, you’re going to avoid the pain. So what you’ll probably do is not put yourself out there. You will not want to go on job interviews, because there’s potential rejection. But what if you made that a pleasurable experience?

And I know that seems crazy, but for me, I know that things change for me when I got excited about being rejected because of who I was becoming. To be a woman who no longer feared being rejected was like freedom to me, because I started to think about what are all the things that I will do in my life if I’m not afraid of someone rejecting me? And so it was this crazy thing happening in my mind where I started linking pleasure to rejection, because you can link pleasure to anything, right? If you practice it and make it familiar, it will become a normal for you.

Video Transcript - Stop #8: Pleasure Islandslim, chic & savvy

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I started to link extreme pleasure to showing up for myself. I started to feel deep pain for letting myself down over and over again. And because we’re going to avoid pain, what started happening for me is that I started showing up, because I didn’t want that deep pain of disappointment. So remember, you get to decide what you link pleasure and pain to, and I want you to do it on purpose.

So I want you to get really clear about what your true pleasures are in life, and I want to make sure that every day you’re filling up your life with those. And again, it can be things as simple as lighting candles, playing beautiful music, making sure that all of your pleasure’s not coming from food or work or spending, right? Because that’s going to create chaos in your life.

Then I want you to figure out what are the false pleasures in my life? Maybe it’s spending too much time on social media. Maybe it is working too much. Maybe it’s binging on Netflix. But be really honest with yourself from a place of compassion, and then I want you to start thinking about how can I wire my brain to make my false pleasures painful and to make my true pleasures more pleasurable? And as a result, you will find yourself pleasurably sauntering towards your sweet spot. I’ll see you in the next video.