SuttaCentral
Hello everyone,
I come with a question on what are actually the pleasures in life.
Is it having children, friends, a husband, a house, a car, tasting good food, travels, music, party, alcool, drugs, movies, series, s**, sleeping, having views about things, thinking about the past and the future that make normal people happy ?
Do you have any ideas that don’t fall in those categories ?
Thank you.
P.S: I’m asking about normal things, not superhuman attainments.
Easy, video games, Youtube. Doing physics homework and getting it right.
Why are you asking?
Metta. Even a dog has Metta. Is it superhuman? 
Also, being kind to others!
When I was a young layman, I didn’t see any pleasure in life except through two things that were binding my mind and I was hoping to get freedom from one of these things by ordaining. The patimokkha would help me to protect myself.
Except these two things, I didn’t see any pleasure in life. Now I’m not a layman, I’m wondering a bit what people are really enjoying and that I’m missing (missing in the physical sense, not in a uttari-manussa-dhamma sense because I don’t have any of these attainments)
Yes, that’s true, mettā makes the mind feel good even without uttari
Been there, done that. Meh! 
Having spent 27 years as a physician, I occasionally run into people I cared for years ago. And even though I may have forgotten, they will remind me “Doc, you operated on my ear…”. And reflecting that I have been able to be of service to them makes me happy. 
I think happiness very much relies on a sense of being in control. Things go as wished for. I want to walk, and i can (which is not self-evident at all). I want to…and I can. When this all becomes problematic, happiness disappears. Then one starts to complain, become negative, dark.
For us many things are so self-evident, especially things like being able to breath, walk, travel, defecate, have taste while eating etc. While all that is not self-evident at all.
I think that especially this idea of permanence around such things, has a lot of influence. It is not easy to be even one moment joyful when things do not go as wished for, i feel, certainly not when something one always enjoyed very much, such taking a walk in nature. Simple things.
Pleasure has, i feel, different sides. One can also be afraid of pleasure, because having pleasure also relies on letting go , and one can be afraid of letting go control, or be scared what other people would think .
In this contexts I also do not believe that seeing or having no pleasure in life an sich is some sign of wisdom. I believe we must always look into the causes and conditions for that. Probably it is just fear and related to Imago issues.
One cannot be happy, i feel, when one is too restraint. Energy must flow, not be blocked. I do not think that dispassion means that one dries up. But it means the end of clinging and that is very different. Being energetic i feel must not be confused with passion.