I am an aspiring hedonist.
But don’t judge me so quickly yet, oh pragmatic American, because I don’t mean that I want to be another bling-blinging, convertible-cruising, shopaholic prancing around with a designer purse and couture velour sweats.
True hedonism is far removed from such gluttony and actually requires a bit of work. In fact, there can be nothing more American than hedonism, because it results in efficient living by maximizing life’s full potential, instead of mere superficial pleasure. And yet, hedonism has a bad rap in American society precisely because we think of it as the latter.
In fact, I think we’re paranoid of the association with anything near hedonistic. If we’re not always efficient and productive, we accuse ourselves of being scummy ingrates.
In our minds, only those who are lazy and spoiled are pleasure-seekers. And people such as Paris Hilton conveniently prove this true … right?
Wrong. Paris Hilton is NOT a hedonist. That’s what we think hedonism is ““ all play and no work ““ but nothing can be so wrong.
True hedonism emphasizes balance, contrary to popular belief that hedonism is pleasure overload. According to Aristotle, it requires wisdom and moral responsibility, which disqualifies Hilton as a hedonist.
But how can Americans ever discover this true meaning in a society of extremes? America does seem like the pleasure-seeker’s paradise. I remember ordering a “medium” pizza in America for the first time after immigrating from Korea to find it the size of a bathtub. While my entire family ended up eating about 1/8 of the entire pizza, we praised the heavens, thanking God for “America, the land of plenty!”
And yet, such abundance of pleasure actually makes hedonism impossible. Living in such an opulent culture desensitizes us to the pleasure experience, destroying any sense of balance. And of course, such extremities only perpetuates redemption through workaholism, causing a vicious cycle.
I suppose it makes perfect sense. After all, pleasure and pain is relative. As in Bertrand Russell’s words, “To be without some of the things you want is an indispensable part of happiness.”
And the true hedonist has the wisdom to maintain such a balance to ensure achievement of happiness. If he only seeks gluttony, he will never be satisfied, and therefore can’t be a hedonist.
And I can attest to these facts because I have been the guinea pig of such theories. A true workaholic to the core, I never allowed room for leisure during the school year, trapped in the efficiency-or-bust mentality. And then during breaks, I followed the play-or-bust mantra, because soon I would have to go back to being a productive machine again.
I’ve been trapped in this cycle since high school, and eventually I began to realize that I was aging and no longer could sustain such an extreme lifestyle. Most importantly, I noticed myself teetering between extreme pleasure and extreme productivity, numb to both at most times. I reached something of a quarter-life crisis, What will I have to look back on except being tossed between gluttony and deprivation?
So this summer, I rebeled against my typical productive mode of being super-efficient yet deprived: in the middle of preparing for grad school exams, I took a dance class. I went to the beach. I ate chocolate every day. Typically, I would have chosen to spend the entire summer working part-time and studying. But when employment prospects seemed grim,
I welcomed the opportunity to actually enjoy living for once, after the initial panic of imagining myself not working around the clock. At first, I felt guilty for my indulgence.
But what is wrong with indulging, especially when I was still studying laboriously? I didn’t need to be at either extremes of productivity and pleasure. I could have BOTH at the same time. What a revolutionary thought ““ in my world, anyway.
And it’s painstaking, trying to maintain a good balance between work and leisure. If only American society would realize this aspect of true hedonism, instead of pinning it as a victim of extremities. And if you are already a true hedonist, congratulations. Be proud, because hedonism is hard work.
E-mail Yoo at jyoo@media.ucla.edu. General comments can be sent to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.