The greatness of one who makes Shabbos pleasurable is well-known, as Chazal said that he is given an unlimited portion, and he is given all of his heart’s desires, and saved from the slavery of the kingships. Chazal said further, “What merit do the rich men of the rest of the world (outside Eretz Yisrael) have? They have the merit of making Shabbos pleasurable, like the story of Yosef who valued Shabbos.” From seeing the level of reward given, a person can understand that by doing this he is giving great pleasure to his Creator, and that this is one of the things through which one sees the love that Hashem shows us, that even when allowing ourselves to take physical pleasure it is considered a good deed and we cause pleasure to our Creator and receive reward for it. How fortunate is the child of woman who has merited this. How fortunate we are; how good is our lot.
Whether one increases or decreases in the exact amount, so long as one’s heart is focused on doing the will of heaven, for in these commandments which contain pleasure and physical enjoyment one needs a lot of self-strengthening in order to make sure that they are being truly performed for the sake of heaven and not just for outward appearance when really he wants just to enjoy himself and therefore says “It is Shabbos today, let us eat, drink and become intoxicated.” The way to check if a person means it truly for the sake of Shabbos is by checking if during the week he follows the desires of this world.
One must of course remember that one cannot transgress the prohibitions of Shabbos in order to fulfil the obligation to make it pleasurable. This applies even to the smallest rabbinical prohibition
