Have you found that you are spending your time feeling okay, but not necessarily content, let alone joyous? I was going to write a post on this but Spirit wanted to come through instead today with this message on joy and happiness. Let me know what you think and whether this resonates with you.

Message from Spirit

We find this (i.e. feeling okay but not content or joyous) a strange way to live. It is without pleasure, without joy, and without love. Where is the satisfaction or the beauty? Where is the reverence and wonder that inspires? Is that really all that you aspire to? Couldn’t there be more for you? Wouldn’t you want there to be more for you?

There are so many ways of looking at joy - it changes with each and every person. One persons’s joy is another’s greatest fear so finding your own joy and happiness is the key to success. Not worrying about what other people think or would do, or even tell you that you should do. It is for you to identify what brings you the most joy, not for someone else to tell you what joy is.

Marketing vs joy

Marketing is designed to pull you in, and it influences each of you in what you believe joy is. Joy is not the brand new car, the big house in the city or frequent trips away. It’s not drinks of any sort and it’s not food in any form, although joy can be found through the community in which you share these items.

Joy and happiness comes from within. Most of you know this, but haven’t mastered what this really means. It comes from being at peace with yourself, from feeling whole. Wholeness comes to those who have done the inner work, to clear themselves of unreleased emotions in order to fully understand who they are. It comes to those who live in acceptance of themselves in all aspects - the good and the not so good. And it comes to those who love themselves and others.

Spread love and kindness

Spreading love and happiness in all its forms automatically brings joy. Sharing kindness on a daily basis is a great place to start. Being grateful every day for even the smallest of things will lift your happiness bit by bit. It prompts you to seek out the good things in every day, and to realise that there is more joy in your life than you realised - you were just too busy to notice.

Recipe for Joy

Our recipe for joy, as you would put it, would go something like this:

1. Before rushing headlong into your day, reflect on what joys you would like to experience that day. Do this before you even get out of bed or reach for your phone. Simply lie in bed in that early morning drowsiness and think of the wonderful things that might take place today.

2. When you find you have a natural break in your day, take a few minutes to close your eyes, breath deeply and relax. A relaxed mind will allow you to notice the good things taking place. A tense mind will only focus on the negative. Do this several times a day if you can.

3. In the evening, particularly on a work day, take some time to slow down again and be really present in what you are doing or who you are with. Leave the events of the day behind you and focus totally on the present. Even if it is just for a short time, this will help you to relax your mind and allow happiness to flow to some greater or lesser extent.

4. Just before you go to sleep every night, run through all the good things that happened in the day. You can write these down if you wish, or just think them through.

Doing these simple four steps will open your eyes to the moments in every day that bring you pleasure. And that will lead you to what brings you joy. You’ll see a pattern emerging and will be able to identify the moments that bring you the greatest pleasure. Knowing these can help you to build more of them into your life.

Decide on your own version of happiness

You may think that your life is not ‘ideal’ but who’s version of ideal are you living up to? Is it yours or is it something you’ve been ‘sold’ through various marketing campaigns or ingrained beliefs that have come from societal norms? Now is the time to decide on your own version of happiness. There is great change taking place all over the world. Take this opportunity to change the way you live, if you can, so that you bring more joy and happiness into your life.

That is all.