Joy: The Ultimate Power Move

What is joy? And why does it even matter? Listen in for a reflection on one of our most powerful gifts hidden in plain sight. Often confused with happiness, it's a much neglected compass and magnet, a deeply nourishing, abiding and meditative state.

Transcript

The undervalued metric of joy.

Your ultimate power move.

So,

What do you think you need to do or get to experience the most joy right now?

Solve a problem?

Get out of a situation you're in?

Change your circumstances?

You'd be wrong.

All the joy you could ever need is right there within you right now.

You are at your essence.

Joy.

Sound crazy?

Well,

When we're not worried about something or caught up in our thinking,

We are in our bodies enjoying the moment.

Would you agree?

So,

Did you spot what I was saying?

In those moments,

All is well.

There are no needs and nothing needs doing.

Even though on the outside there appears to be plentiful needs,

All is not well and the to-do list is long.

And would be even longer if we just knew how to solve our current dilemma.

Our natural state is intrinsic well-being.

We are aware of it to the degree we are not caught up in personal story that is either our habitual or arbitrary thinking.

Our minds will effortlessly and eventually self-adjust back to joy and clarity,

Creativity,

Wisdom,

And trust-fueled agency when we don't jump on the runaway train of our personal thinking otherwise known as intellectualizing,

Worrying,

And looping.

And if you ever think for a moment and just think,

Even think for a moment and see,

Just reflect on that.

Isn't that the case?

That when you're immersed in something,

In activity,

Which is essentially being immersed in the moment,

You don't have any problems.

Nothing needs doing and you're perfectly fine,

Right?

So,

Okay,

Don't take my word for it.

Run a little experiment on yourself.

When you are caught up in thinking,

I.

E.

Worrying,

Judging,

And analyzing,

How does it feel?

I'll tell you from my own personal experience,

It doesn't feel great.

Not joyful,

I imagine,

For you too.

What happens when you stop following that thought train in your head and just be with whatever feeling you're experiencing?

You start to feel spacious,

Yes?

And spacious feels good,

Joyous.

And where there is joy,

There is wisdom.

And where there is wisdom,

There is creativity.

And where there's creativity,

There is power.

Because they're all sheets on the same bed.

What kind of thoughts do you think might come through when you touch this space that is beyond concepts and constructs?

If you said clearer thoughts,

You'd be right.

Because you'll get that one thought that might be the first of a stream of thoughts that feels so clear,

And resonant,

And peaceful,

And you know you just got your answer.

May take a minute,

A day,

A week,

Or more,

But it will happen.

It's how the human system is designed to work.

Maybe you're going away somewhere and you're going to be staying on site and you really want to go.

And then it's like,

You can't really decide.

You can't book just yet because you're waiting on some other information for another part of your life.

So you can't book,

But you really want to book.

And you're getting a little bit kind of worked up because it's like,

You really want to do this thing,

But you just feel like you can't make any decisions or everything's depending on everything else.

And then you just decide,

Well,

I can't make a decision right now.

So do you know what,

Instead of just reminding myself of that fact,

I'll just go and do something.

I'll go and do some gardening,

Or some cooking,

Or laundry,

Or just do the washing up.

And you're doing that,

And you just sort of get into that nice flow.

So you're just enjoying whatever mundane activity you're doing,

But it's just,

It's enjoyable because you're just in it.

And you're not worrying about decisions that you're not able to make yet.

And then someone calls you later and says,

Oh,

You know,

I want to go to this place.

And there's,

But I'm going to stay off site because blah,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah.

And they say,

You know,

Would you,

Do you want to stay with me?

Don't worry if you don't want to,

Because I'm happy to have a room to myself,

But just in case,

You know,

If you haven't got anywhere to stay.

And then in that moment,

You think,

Oh,

Great.

If I don't get to book in time to stay on site,

I've got somewhere else I can stay.

Problem solved.

Or maybe there wasn't even a problem in the first place,

Depending on how you look at it.

So,

Yes,

A clear,

A clearer thought,

A more resonant thought will always come through because it's how our bodily things are designed,

Our mind-body systems are designed to work.

The answer could be the next step in facing a particular situation.

It may be a hang on in there,

Wait a while kind of answer,

Or it might be knowing who or how to ask for help,

Or it might be resolution that sees the problem disappear,

Or you might realize there was no problem in the first place.

It was simply a case.

It was simply a case of a molehill turning into a mountain,

Turning into a minefield because of your adeptness at getting caught up in your head.

Financial,

Health,

Work,

And relational problems don't affect this intrinsic well-being that we carry.

And you're just in that state of slow.

You're just immersed.

It's just the general slow of life,

And there's just no thinking.

And when we're tuned to that state,

It actually tends to affect all those problems that we feel we have.

So you could reflect about what you might want to include in your life to allow you to be able to touch that space more often,

And there are different ways to do that.

We want outside to match up to our thoughts of what's needed to sort a problem so we can feel okay.

As it happens,

We'd be operating on a false premise because our state of being,

Sometimes known as state of mind,

Is created as cause,

Which means life flows from within and out,

From internal to external,

From inside to outside.

You get the gist.

What does that mean?

It means that our internal workings affect our circumstances,

Not the other way around.

And I have to read this for myself and just listen to it over and over because,

Honestly,

Sometimes it's very hard to see.

So I'm going to repeat that bit.

What does that mean?

It means that our internal workings affect our circumstances,

Not the other way around.

So we're wanting our outside to match up to what we feel needs to happen so that we can feel okay,

But actually it's the other way around.

Because what's going on internally affects what we're perceiving externally,

And sometimes it's a hard one to swallow.

Remember,

We're always living in the feeling of our internal workings,

Our mind,

Body,

Functioning,

Our thought,

Our sensations.

We're not living in the feeling of our circumstances,

Which is so hard to hear,

Isn't it?

Because something seems so good.

I have to remind myself that there's something that happens in between the circumstance and then the feeling that you have,

And that's a thought.

It's a judgment or something that's happening very quickly,

Very under the radar,

And that's what we feel.

And it's very hard sometimes to see what to do about things.

I've always found for me the best thing is I just go and do something else.

I might pray,

But sometimes I actually need to take some activity and do something before I even pray,

Like go and wash up,

Go empty the bins,

Go outside,

Change of position,

Change of posture,

Change of state always helps.

So we live in the feeling of what's going on inside of us,

Not the feeling of what's going on outside of us.

And I know,

I know how it can really,

Really,

Really feel like it's the other way around.

Something I've been mulling over,

You know,

The Creator is often described with words such as holy and wise and loving,

Merciful,

Omnipotent.

They're all true,

But have you ever heard the Creator described as joyous or joyful?

Probably didn't hear that.

Truth is,

The Creator is the source of all joy.

It can't be any other way.

And at our core,

We are made of the God stuff,

So feel free to reveal joy and receive joy through activities,

Relationships,

And simply by staying in your body and slip into that feeling space of all is well,

Despite any and all appearances to the contrary.

It's a state of being,

Not wishful thinking.

With that understanding,

It's not denial,

It's wisdom's den.