Helps me figure out which topics really need attention. What's painful isn't always obvious, so you first start with finding *easy* and *hard/difficult* things. Then, you look at those that have deeper emotions attached. Not all easy things are pleasurable and not all difficult topics are painful. We want to narrow down to those that indeed are either painful or pleasurable as they have the most leverage to help (or distract us) from reaching our goals. The painful issues disrupt our flow, the pleasurable ones accelerate it. ![[Pleasure-Pain-River-Flow.excal]] ## Topics You may have your own list of things, but I'm coming back to the following list over and over. So you can use this to bootstrap/kick-start your map if you will! ### Relationships - Body - Father - Mother - Partner - Family - Friends - Colleagues - Boss ### Further important topics - Home - Location - Climate - Sex - Money - Power ## Process ### 1. Sort topics by "easy" or "hard" Take a moment for each topic that's in your life right now and see if, generally speaking, this thing feels like it comes easy or hard to you. ### 2. Find the pleasurable and painful topics - Looking at the easy ones, which ones are particularly pleasurable? - Looking at the hard ones, which ones are particularly painful? ### 3. Find the stories behind the strong topics ## Template ![[Pleasure – Pain Map Template.excalidraw]] ## Related - [[The 'Towards pleasure, away from pain' Principle]]