Partners in Pleasure: Sharing Success, Creating Joy, Fulfilling Dreams-Together

Learning to look at life with four eyes and two hearts joined into one soul

Continuing his transmission of 2,000-year-old Polynesian wisdom that began with The Pleasure Prescription, Paul Pearsall introduces in this new book what be calls "naupaka love" or aloha kakou—love shared, profound companionship, surrendering to a relationship in all its dimensions and embracing it as a lifelong mission of discovery and mutual pleasure.

Our society tells us that individual success and self-fulfillment are the keys to happiness. This book asks, If that is true, why do so many of us—even those who are in a relationship—feel unhappy and alone? And it answers that there is no joy if there is no one to share it with. As a poet said long ago, "No man is an island .... "

A uniquely warm combination of oral wisdom and current research, Partners in Pleasure is nothing less than a re-visioning of marriage. It offers eight lessons in mahele (sharing)—eight pleasure prescriptions for partners, from dreaming die same dream to becoming one body. Woven throughout are partnering tests; relationship lessons from Hawai`i's foremost kupuna (elders) and kahuna (healers or priests); and insights from Dr. Pearsall's own work and seminars.

Partners in Pleasure shows couples how they can come together to face the challenges of life—conflict, sexual compatibility, child-rearing, career setbacks and getting old—and grow ever stronger together, united in heart.

Pearsall, author of the New York Times best seller The Pleasure Prescription, looks closely at how intimate relationships can be strengthened by paying more attention to the "we" instead of the "me." Like his earlier works, this one is based on Hawaiian concepts that arose from the legend of the naupaka plant, which only has half-blossoms and grows either at the shore or in the mountains. According to the legend, the naupaka was created when the gods separated two lovers and then changed them into plants that only become full flowers when they are put together. Though the legend is charming, Pearsall's main point that couples shouldn't fear losing themselves in each other and instead should focus on the strength that merging gains them is not particularly groundbreaking. Some of his concepts, too, may be hard for "continental" (i.e., Euro-American) readers to swallow. For example, Pearsall includes exercises on how couples can send dreams to each other and perform "cardio-synchronization," which ostensibly allows them to experience the rush of getting their hearts to beat concurrently. Public libraries who serve patrons with an interest in Oceania and Oceanic philosophy should consider.
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.