This week on the show, I’m exploring the 4 pillars of joy: Inspiration, Mindfulness, Action, and Fun. If you’ve been listening awhile, you know that I think of joy as a wayfinding emotion. I have seen joy dance with people, reach out for people, even when they are in their darkest times or most difficult times. Joy can look like a tiny inkling of hope, a little nudge to call a friend or a doctor; joy looks like that second in your life, like several guests and so many of my clients have sited - that you know that there is “more” to your life than whatever your current crappy circumstances are. That you know you want more, desire more, that you personally are meant for more than what you’re experiencing right now.

This week we’ll look at one of the quotes that inspired my show, and I’m going deeper with it around HOW to find more joy. What I’ve seen in the fact that joy is a choice is that there’s more to it. Joy can be lived out in multiple ways. I see that there are patterns in how I’ve danced with joy in my life, and how I’ve seen joy be jump started in other people’s lives. That part is fascinating. I’m focusing on my favorite four patterns today, the ones I’ve started calling the four tenets or four pillars of joy.

The four pillars are:
1. Inspiration
2. Mindfulness
3. Action
4. Fun

Resources
Kate Swoboda on Episode 135: The Courage Habit
The Courage Habit: How to Accept Your Fears, Release the Past, and Live Your Courageous Life by Kate Swoboda on Amazon
Suzan Colon on Episode 133: Yoga Mind
Suzan Colon’s book: Yoga Mind: Journey Beyond the Physical, 30 Days to Enhance Your Practice and Revolutionize Your Life From the Inside Out
Episode with Fred LeBlanc on Jump Start Your Joy
Episode with Julia Samuel on Jump Start Your Joy
Andrea Owen on Episode 115: How to Stop Feeling Like Shit
How to Stop Feeling Like Shit by Andrea Owen (on Amazon)
A Thousand Names of Joy: Living in Harmony with the Way Things Are by Byron Katie on Amazon
The Power of Intention by Wayne Dyer on Amazon

This week on the show, I’m excited to share a solocast all about why joy matters. I recently had a series of aha moments around the interviews with Fred Leblanc and Julia Samuels, along with the work I’ve been doing in Tiffany Han’s Inner Circle - that led me to a realization that joy isn’t just a choice, but it’s a necessity and it’s something we need to make room for everyday, in some way.

This big aha moment has roots in four places:

1. Living a joyful life, and being dedicated to joy means going beyond choosing joy. This first part comes from the Henri Nouwen quote, “Joy is a choice and we must keep choosing it.”
2. It means actively practicing joy and spending time with joy. Joy is energy, and we can choose to engage with this energy. (Fred Leblanc from Episode 125)
3. We can carve out time for joy, making it something we add to our days, purposefully. Life will continue to throw difficult things at us. (Julia Samuel, Episode 127)
4. This ties in with the Law of Attraction, and setting aside time to “play” with joy, you are “Practicing the Vibration of Joy.”

In this episode, I talk about:

• How we decide to focus our energy, and how emotions are tied with energy
• The impact that my discussion with Fred LeBlanc had on me, around making choices of how we spend our energy
• How in grief work, those who are grieving are encouraged to spend pockets of time feeling something besides grief (along with other practices)
• That we need to make room for, and carve out time to interact with joy every day, before we get to the place of feeling detached or distracted
• That we can develop a practice of joy, and build it into our days
• How scout ants set out to find things, daily, and the purpose is exploration (just as you should set out to discover joy). They don’t always find food, but they keep going.
• Once you’ve discovered joy, accessing it and growing on it may feel more in flow.
• Being careful not to judge yourself about how you practice joy, what it looks like, or if finding joy is a worthy practice. Put negative self talk aside, and keep going.

Resources

Fred LeBlanc on Jump Start Your Joy (Episode 125) http://jumpstartyourjoy.com/2018/03/fredleblanc/

Julia Samuel on Jump Start Your Joy (Episode 127)http://jumpstartyourjoy.com/2018/03/julia-samuel/

Julia Cameron’s book, The Artist’s Way, on Amazon https://amzn.to/2H1GYEx

Sign up for the Confidence Webinar by visiting this link. https://app.convertkit.com/landing_pages/359391

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