Direct pleasure

As its name suggests, direct pleasure is a sensation of well being felt directly from and immediately after a stimulation, a thought or an action. Thus experiencing sexual pleasure, enjoying a delicious meal, appreciating music, crying with joy at a reunion, being bowled over by a work of art, bursting with joy from exchanging a look with a loved one and feeling the tingling of discovery are all examples of direct pleasure because the experience is immediate, it has not been deferred and has not been achieved via an unpleasant experience. The only thing which motivates direct pleasure is the wish to obtain it. It has not been put off in time, it is not being used to compensate a frustration, nor to avoid an unpleasant situation. It occurs here and now.

The Wisdom of Pleasure, Chapter 1

THE QUEST FOR PLEASURE !

What we seek above all is what gives us satisfaction, entertainment, fun, pleasure and happiness. The quest for pleasure is the basic motive behind every action and behaviour pattern we adopt. "Everything that we do, we do because it gives us some sort of pleasure either indirect or direct(1)." Never the less, some people may doubt this statement because, as they might say, they get no pleasure from getting up for work, washing the dishes, tolerating the freezing cold winters, paying tax, dinning at their in law's, etc. Of course there are many things in life which we do not enjoy doing, but even these are motivated by the quest for pleasure. The explanation behind this apparant paradox where on the one hand everything we do is motivated by our desire for pleasure and yet on the other we also seem to carry out behaviour which is unpleasant a priori, is that there are two types of pleasures: direct and indirect.

The Wisdom of Pleasure, chapter 1