Epicurus's Idea Of Pleasure

Epicurus describes pleasure as “the alpha and omega of blessed life”. By this he means that it is a something that influences our choices and decision since we seek pleasure when we are in the absence of it. To further elaborate on this, it is something that we seek in the beginning of our life, guides our choices throughout and we continue to attain pleasures till the end of our life. Epicurus goes on to say that not all pleasures satisfy our personal needs and at times we submit ourselves to pain only in times when we try to obtain a greater pleasure that is the consequence of that pain. One example of that type of pain would be eating healthy (which some people relate to as a pain) in the hopes to attain pleasure of being healthy and/or

One pleasure that he describes of this nature is wisdom, wisdom is a type of pleasure that when we seek it gives us other virtues which in turn gives us a more blessed life and relieves those troubles of the soul. I would tend to agree with Epicurus that in our modern day society we are constantly being told to seek more physical pleasures like goods (iPhones), being wealthy or sexual pleasure. We should instead try to seek pleasures that fulfills our lives, for example some people thoroughly enjoy being educated in philosophy because it gives them a different viewpoints on certain topics like death or religion. By seeking out these types of pleasures we achieve a more “blessed life” than just seeking material goods since we tend to always seek another pleasure and obtaining the more sensual pleasures will not easily satisfy our mind/soul. This idea of attaining meaningful pleasure is further highlighted by Epicurus discussion on death within the Letter to Menoeceus especially with the notion that although the more sensual pleasures gives us a more instant gratification, our death will make these types pleasures meaningless. Letter of Epicurus highlights many ideas that have been retold on what we should value in our lives, and many people would tend to agree with his notions of pleasure but may immediately in their