Where does your joy come from?
It took me years to realize I waited for joy to come from outside circumstances.
Waiting for my son to laugh to bring a smile. Waiting for an experience or song to move my body. Waiting for my husband to say thank you for the dinner I’ve cooked. Waiting for my client to say “you’ve changed my life. Waiting to go on a trip, traveling to a meditation retreat to feel joy.
The better question is: If you stripped away everything and left with nothing–would you still feel joy?
Or be a hot mess?
Does an infinite source of joy even exist?
I’ve sat with this inquiry and can now say with confidence that infinite joy does exist.
It simply must be cultivated as a habit.
Joy as a Habit
What?! Joy is a habit. Yes. That’s what I’ve discovered.
While you have power to create circumstances that will likely bring you joy—we’ve all been in those situations where we should feel joyful, but we’re not. Or those times when you shouldn’t feel joy cause of crappy circumstances, yet you do.
We just explored this in a recent Activate Joy event where I spoke at for the ShiftUp community. Here we are practicing joy in the body by smiling for one minute followed by laughing for one minute.
Awkward. Yet super effective to your well being.
In Ron Gutman’s TED talk on the Hidden Power of Smiling he shares how a simple smile has a measurable effect on your wellbeing from firing off the same reward mechanisms in the brain equivalent to receiving $25,000 cash or eating 2000 bars of chocolate.
He shares how “Unlike chocolate, smiling can actually make us healthier…it reduces the level of stress enhancing hormones that cortisol, adrenaline and dopamine, increases the level of mood-enhancing hormones [endorphins] and also reduces blood pressure.”
If you want to cultivate joy as a habit. Give it a go and smile and/or laugh for 1 minute to your favorite song. Notice how your mood shifts before and after. Then like any habit, create consistency for even just 3 days in a row to start setting an alarm to randomly laugh and smile for a minute. You may feel dumb initially, but I promise—it’s gets easier.
When I did this practice many times through 3 days, I found myself laughing out loud randomly, while brushing my teeth. It was as if joy was just bubbling out of me for no reason and it felt so good.
Joy Assessment
Here are some questions to assess where your joy comes from:
On a scale of 1-10, 10 being joyful, how joyful do you feel on average over the week?
Think of what brings you joy. Do you depend on an experience to give you joy? For example, once I travel to that dream place, I’ll feel joy. Once I have solid friends and family relationships, I’ll feel joy. Once I make enough money in my business, I’ll give back, then feel joy.
Is what brings you joy a desire of the ego or soul? Check in with your body to. help you discern. Does your body feel more expansive, love, light, and bright or heavy, contracting and fear based.
Joy Practices
Once you get better at discerning true joy from within that reaction based, if-then joy, you can start to practice joy in the unexpected areas of life.
Most humans don’t like change. The uncertain unknown sucks and we try to find control in it. Instead, lean into the transitions of life as a home to discover joy anyway.
Make it a game. See if you can find joy in the most unexpected places: wounded relationships, pain in your body, or triggers.
It’s not that you need to feel joy 24/7. But by cultivating and practicing joy as a habit, you then have choice. If joy can be a choice, generated for no reason, what might open up in your life?
Consider your life circumstances have zero bearing on what degree of joy you feel. Imagine the liberation of being able to walk into any fire, and the power of being able to choose joy (if you desire) or not. That is true freedom.
I implore you, choose to smile for no reason. Laugh for no reason. Smile at yourself. When I have done this, life gets a lot less serious and more fun and light.
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Anna Choi, Founder of Soljoy.Life, Energy Master, Black Belt, and 2x TEDx Speaker, helps high achieving, mindful entrepreneurs tap into boundless energy through her signature program Ignite: 40 Days to Aliveness. She takes clients from scattered, overwhelmed energy to conscious, consistent micro health habits so they feel more health, happiness, and peace embodying their soul’s highest potential. If you want more energy, Wswatch this free training video series.
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