XXXII
DOKKŌDŌ PRECEPT TWO
“Do not seek pleasure for its own sake.”
Pleasure should be reserved for those earned moments that come after you have struggled to achieve your goals. If you seek out pleasure in other forms, you hurt yourself long term as you diminish your drive to achieve.
It is okay to take pleasure in the small tasks of your day, such as eating, but always you should remember that eating is done to fuel your body. Food is the building blocks of your body, so that you can continue your purpose. Writing.
Allow yourself to enjoy the moment that comes after you have written an excellent chapter, or published a book, but remain cognizant that your pleasure was earned. Whereas, if you use drugs or quick fixes for pleasure, you have not earned it. Those short-term pleasures will fade quickly, and each time you indulge you will be forced to increase your dosage.
When you derive your pleasure from accomplishments, you reinforce the processes that helped you achieve it, and thus ensure that you will do so again. Achievements will outlive yourself, and act as milestones along your path of life. When the journey becomes turbulent, you can look back on what you have already achieved and bolster yourself against the obstacles before you.
The “Dokkōdō” (Japanese: 獨行道) (“The Path of Aloneness”, “The Way to Go Forth Alone”, or “The Way of Walking Alone”), is a short work written by Miyamoto Musashi a week before he died in 1645.
[source: Wikipedia]
FORWARD
This came about as a journal to myself. This is a series of tough love lessons that helped me on my own journey as an author.
Buy Slay Your Dragon: A Motivational Guide for Writers today and get the best meditations from this series all in one place.
If you’ve found this series helpful in your own journey, help spread the word by buying a copy and leaving a review.
Blurb
Struggling to make your writing dream a reality?
Can’t find the fire inside to finish that book?
Worried no one will want to read your book?
It’s time you Slay Your Dragon!
This is not another craft book. Or yet another, writer, writing about writing.
No.
Slay Your Dragon: a Motivational Guide for Writers is a series of daily meditations from Nicholi A.K. Baldron.
This book was produced using his own personal journal of tough love feedback to himself.
Follow along and see what he told himself to become an international bestseller in Fantasy and Mystery.
WARNING: This book is not intended for those with a sensitive disposition, there are several other excellent books that are less blunt. Instead, I have published this for fellow authors like myself, who need to be called out for their possible hubris and sometimes thick-headed nature.
