Why Not Find Your Joy Where You Find Your Joy?
Don’t let anyone rain on your parade.
People love to knock things. Especially online. Everywhere you turn, someone has derogatory comments or criticism regarding things that bring people joy.
For example, I am loving the Ahsoka series from Star Wars nearing the end of its initial run. Yet I’ve seen multiple posts about why it sucks, what’s wrong with it, and so on. Sorry if it’s not bringing you joy the same as it’s bringing me joy.
An even better example is the autumn obsession with all things pumpkin spice. Everywhere you turn, you can find pumpkin spice this and pumpkin spice that. And while to me this seems to go a little overboard – if you’re into it, enjoy.
We have become so deeply hyper-critical as a society that we have seemingly utterly abandoned the idea of live and let live, don’t stick your nose in other people’s business, and the like. Why can’t we just let what brings someone joy to bring them joy without adding a “But” to it?
Thus, for lots of people – they don’t even bother to find their joy. Then, if they do, they keep it under wraps for fear of someone taking a massive steaming dump all over it.
Why are we so afraid of joy?
Modern society seems to have a nearly pathological fear of finding joy. Like if something brings you joy, it’s so damned precious that you can’t let anyone else in.
The larger issue, however, is that when we’re faced with all the pain, suffering, and awfulness in the world – it’s frequently implied that joy is undeserved or wrong in that face of that. How can we have any joy when the world is burning around us?
The truth is – the world is always going to have shit going down. It always has and it always will. One group will oppress another; some group’s rights will be trampled upon; some asshole will use their greedy narcissism to take power over others and abuse it; people will be suffering due to this, that, or the other thing.
There is little to nothing you or I can do for the world at large. Yet this often gets viewed as selfish, unkind, and uncompassionate. But let’s be real here – if you live on the East Coast of the United States, what can you do about the war in Ukraine, atrocities in parts of Africa, and oppression in North Korea? You can attend protests, vote for people who give a shit about foreign policy, and send emails/make calls/post blogs – and that’s about it.
But when it comes to your life, what you do, you have control. You can make choices and decisions to do things that bring you joy. And there is no need to take that steaming dump on someone else’s joy (unless their joy is in the cruelty, uncompassionate, and unkind treatment of other human beings).
A little joy can accumulate. That can spread from you to others around you. In turn, that can begin to impact the big picture.
Energy, vibration, and frequency
To some, this is going to come across as hooky-spooky bullshit. But it’s not.
Everyone and everything in the entire Universe is made of energy. Energy takes on all sorts of forms, tangible and intangible, from the tiniest subatomic particle to the largest galaxy in the cosmos. All energy – material or immaterial – vibrates. That vibration is at one frequency or another. This is all scientific fact.
Lower frequency vibrations are negative. Higher frequency vibrations are positive. This is where the Law of Attraction comes in. The frequency you vibrate at draws like to it. So – if you’re feeling bad and low-frequency, you tend to attract more people and things that will build on that. Conversely, if you’re feeling good and high-frequency, you tend to attract more people and things that will build on that.
Where people often take the Law of Attraction too far is in the notion that via ongoing, positive, high-frequency, you can manifest anything from thin air. Just think and feel positive and voila! Anything you can dream of, it’ll come to you. Enter toxic positivity.
To create anything at all – you must do work. Raising your vibrational frequency is done via a combination of your thoughts, feelings, actions, and intentions. Active conscious awareness of what you are choosing to think, feel, intend, and act upon. In other words – mindfulness.
While this is relatively easy – the work that goes into it can be challenging. Especially in the face of our fear-based, lack-focus, all-too-frequently negative society. But the only one who can determine your life experience is you.
Mindfulness and joy
Mindfulness is active conscious awareness. Via mindfulness, you can determine who, what, how, where, and why you are. This begins by asking yourself questions like,
- What am I thinking?
- What am I feeling?
- How am I feeling?
- What am I doing?
- What do I intend?
You assume control over your conscious awareness, here and now. The now is the only time that’s really, truly, real.
Joy often is seen as a big, overarching notion. But the truth is that joy can be utterly tiny and seemingly insignificant.
Joy is when my cat leaps up onto my desk, crawls onto my chest, and purrs like crazy. The first sip of my first cup of coffee as I read in the morning is joyful. Seeing my words appear on the screen brings me joy. Feeling the sun on my face is joy.
Big, small, or in-between, joy is something everyone has the right to seek, find, and enjoy. It doesn’t matter in the slightest where you come from, what your background is, or anything of that ilk – you are worthy and deserving of finding your joy wherever you find your joy.
Other people don’t need to understand. You can love pumpkin spice everything, the Star Wars prequels, that movie everyone else says is the worst, or whatever else that brings you joy. Don’t let anyone rain on your parade. Celebrate what raises your energetic frequency – because this moment, the present, is the only moment that matters and is really, truly, real. Joy is worth finding, having, and experiencing as such.
Finding your joy where your joy can be found isn’t hard
It’s all about working with mindfulness of your thoughts, feelings, and intentions to direct your actions.
When you understand that you are made of energy, that energy vibrates at a frequency, that higher frequencies are healthier and more positive, and that joy raises your frequency and can spread beyond you – you can find your joy wherever it can be found. Knowing that you’re worthy and deserving of joy and its positive impact, you can seek it out – and disregard if others shit upon it.
This empowers you – and in turn, your empowerment can empower others around you.
Taking an approach to positivity and negativity – from the vast cylinder that exists between them – shifts life in a way that opens more dialogue. With a broader dialogue, you can explore and share where you are between the extremes and how that impacts you here and now.
Choosing thoughts, feelings, actions, and intentions for yourself employs an approach and attitude of positivity for realizing amazing potential and possibilities for your life.
The better aware you are of yourself in the now, the more you can do to choose and decide how your life experiences will be. When that empowers you, it can spread to those around you to their empowerment.
Thank you for coming along on this journey.
This is the five-hundred and fourth (504) entry of my Positivity series. I hope that these weekly messages might help spread positive energies for everyone. Feel free to share, re-blog, and spread the positivity.
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