One of the more annoying things about joy is it is possible to cultivate. Joy, it turns out is not elusive. For a split second learning this I felt the temptation to add it to the ever evolving list of shit I need to be better at, #756 Cultivate more joy. Then I stopped because I don’t treat myself like a gut renovation anymore.
There are several components and pathways that lead to us experiencing joy. One of them is awe. I am verrrrry horny for awe. I seek it out, I missed it desperately during the pandemmy it’s something I didn’t realize I’ve always had a need to seek out. Didn’t seem bad, awe feels good, never gave it a lot of thought. It’s also how I trigger joy. Who knew? Certainly not me!
Awe can be about anything, for me I often feel it in nature and at what someone’s creativity did, especially if that made me laugh. Katherine told me awe is also very hot right now in the research community so I am curious to see what starts to come out of that.
Joy has a bit of a reputation. Some find it super overwhelming and a little scary, others called it elusive. It’s pretty important to our mental health so maybe we all need to consider our joy more.
Positive Psychology and what emotions create the umbrella of happiness didn’t really start being studied in earnest until the late nineties. So if joy, happiness, and positive emotions feel hard for you you’re not alone. We literally as a people didn’t want to spend time and money on understanding it all until roughly 35 years ago.
I’m so thrilled Katherine wanted to talk about joy. A few years ago I started saying to my therapist what was the point of anything I had done in my life if I didn’t experience more joy? If I didn’t have more fun, or laugh more. What is the point? Why work so hard? Why go to therapy weekly? Why do any of it if you’re not going to open up and see what joy lies ahead. I am a WAY better person when I’m loosening the reigns and laughing at a lot of silly shit or taking in the vastness of the world versus thinking life is a long slog to just be endured and I have to be a good soldier of it.
We don’t choose our suffering but I became aware I was choosing to prolong my own. I knew the work of healing I didn’t know the work of joy. Seems like just as valid a use of my time as anything else. Hopefully yours too.
Plz tell me all about your joys. What brings it, how do you experience it, what are some tiny joys in your life?
xx. A
Joy things:
Everything’s a practice including joy
Billie Piper brings me joy, and I just found this show
This recipe, these capers, this essay bringing me joy this week
Tricia with the excellent question
Loved discovering Mirna via researching this episode
Zeba brings a lot of joy
Quiet profundity the older I get the more I understand what those words mean together
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