Om målet med tillvaron är att vara lycklig förefaller det viktigt att kunna njuta av livet på ett enkelt sätt. En som hade svårt för det var filosofen Michel Foucault:

Actually, I think I have real difficulty in experiencing pleasure. I think that pleasure is a very difficult behavior. It’s not as simple as that to enjoy one’s self. [Laughs] And I must say that’s my dream. I would like and I hope I’ll die of an overdose of pleasure of any kind. [Laughs] Because I think it’s really difficult, and I always have the feeling that I do not feel the pleasure, the complete total pleasure, and for me, it’s related to death.

Han hade dock vissa hjälpmedel:

There is also the fact that some drugs are really important for me because they are the mediation to those incredibly intense joys that I am looking for, and that I am not able to experience, to afford by myself. It’s true that a glass of wine, of good wine, old and so on, may be enjoyable, but it’s not for me. A pleasure must be something incredibly intense. But I think that I am not the only one like that. I’m not able to give myself and others those middle-range pleasures that make up everyday life. Such pleasures are nothing for me, and I am not able to organize my life in order to make place for them. That’s the reason why I’m not a social being, why I’m not really a cultural being, why I’m so boring in my everyday life. [Laughs] It’s a bore to live with me.

Man kanske ska vara lycklig över en förmåga att känna lycka över små saker i vardagen? Eller missar man de där härliga men farliga njutningsexplosionerna då? 

Citaten är från Ethics: Subjectivity and Truth, s. 129.