5 Ways to Step into Joy

Let's just bring it to light and call it what it is.  Many of us are struggling with the holiday blues extra hard this year due to not being able to be with your family.  I have seen posts of positivity followed by a stream of comments filled with anger and frustration due to these circumstances.  It hurts my heart to see such sadness and hurt spreading across the country and the world.  So yes.  I am going to focus on how to increase your levels of joy despite  what is happening all around you.  

First, let's take a look at what stops us from experiencing joy.  We can break these down into joy stealers and joy challenges.  In this article, we are going to focus on Joy Stealers and how to overcome them to feel more joy throughout your life.   

Joy stealers are attitudes and thought patterns that prevent us from experiencing joy.  Some common joy stealers include:

• Worry.  We have a tendency to catastrophize most situations. We project negative outcomes on situations.  Have you ever made a minor mistake at work and your immediate thought  was "That's it!  I'm going to get fired", and you begin to mentally prepare yourself for this outcome.  Surely I am not the only one that has had this experience, right?!  This way of thinking is actually part of our survival mechanism. To think about every possibly negative outcome is a way we protect ourselves from danger and learn to survive.  So when you find yourself engaging in this thinking, know that it is 'normal', and that it is going to take intentional effort to shift your mindset.  
• Focus on the Negative. This is more of a learned or conditioned response, though it still serves the purpose of some sort of protection.  This is a tendency to only see the negatives in any situation.  An example would be having an opportunity at a 'dream job' and negating all of the endless positive possibilities by only thinking about the poor timing of the opportunity, or that you would have a longer commute, or different hours.  Or maybe you have a perfectly functional house, but can only see all of the things that you want to change or believe 'need' to be changed to make it the house you want it to be. Here is the thing...whatever we focus on creates our reality.  If we see things as 'all negative', that is what life will be.  I strongly suggest you read the book The Luck Factor by Richard Wiseman to further your understanding of the power of negative vs. positive thinking patterns. 
• Negative Thought Patterns.  This goes hand in hand with focusing on the negative.  Here, we look at the patterns our thoughts are creating.  We can look at the dichotomous, or all-or-nothing thinking patterns that appear.  These thoughts include words or phrases such as "I always have the worst luck" and "my dreams will never come true".  When you start noticing these thinking patterns, it is important to bring them to awareness without judgment so you are able to honestly challenge them. 
• Judgmental Thinking.  We are not looking at the helpful judgments here-which are those that keep us safe, such as "don't go down that dark alley where you see a man with a weapon".  We are talking bout the judgments that create unnecessary suffering.  These thinking patterns include judgements about yourself, others, groups, or situations.  Judging ourself is conditioned response to protect us from fears of rejection, abandonment, etc.  We have been conditioned to believe that if we judge ourself, others will not be able to hurt us.  We have also been conditioned to believe that self judgment motivates change.  All of this is incorrect.  When we begin judging others, it is often a fear response of our own insecurities.  Let's shift our mindset and actions to compassion and love. Check out the meditation attached to this article to practice a Mindful Mediation to decrease judgments.
• Joy Set Point. This is by far the most interesting to me.  We all have a joy set point that was created by our family.  It determines how much joy we allow ourselves to feel.    If your family ran on a joy level of 10 (on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the highest), then you will also allow yourself to feel a 10 on the joy level scale.  If your family was skeptical of joy, then you have been conditioned with this belief.  For instance, in my family, there was a belief that if something 'good' happened, it would surely be followed by something 'bad' happening, which definitely had impacted my ability to fully allow joy into my life.  This created my joy set point in life.  

Now that you are aware of these Joy Stealers, what are you going to do about them?  Well...I am going to give you a few ideas here...5 to be exact!

• Gratitude and Appreciation.  Nothing moves you quicker into joy than gratitude and appreciation.  Keep a daily gratitude journal.  Every morning, I keep a journal with 10 gratitudes.  Some like to do this exercise at night.  It doesn't matter when you do it.  It just matters that you do it.  Expand this gratitude throughout the day by expressing it to others.  Let others know how much you appreciate their gestures.  Recently, as I was thinking about how grateful I was that I have been able to wake up with my kids and put them to bed at night-for the first time in 10 years because I was so busy climbing the corporate ladder.  I then expressed my gratitude to my husband for being on the road for his business so I could spend more time at home with the kids.  It felt good to acknowledge him, and it increased my own gratitude and joy in that moment.
• Mindset Shift.   As mentioned in the Joy Stealers, we have a tendency to engage in negative thinking patterns and focusing on the negative.  So when it comes to increasing joy, it must be a daily intentional decision.  Choose to focus on the positive and re-direct conversations that are becoming negative.  
• Being Present.  Increasing your time spent in the present moment is a sure way to increase your moments of joy.  Dwelling on the past often creates feelings of sadness, depressed, and resentment.  Even when we are focusing on positive memories, if we sit there too long, we become sad and longing for that moment that has passed.  Focusing on the future often creates feeling of anxiety, worry, and frustration.  We try to micro-manage every aspect of our lives as if we can predict and control every detail of our lives.  When we are able to focus our attention on the present moment, and really engage in our surroundings, not only does the worry or sadness fall away, the joy increases, as does our connection with ourselves, others, and our Spiritual Connection.    
• Joy Memories.  Now I want you to be careful with this one.  Remember, if we allow ourselves to dwell too much in the past, we can become resentful and sad that this time has passed.  With this, we want to simply recall those moments we felt pure joy.  We want to allow ourselves to recall this moment to remind ourself that we have felt moments of joy.  This also releases brain chemicals that increase good feelings!  Recalling joy memories with others greatly increases the feeling of joy because everyone's joy level is rising.  This would be a great holiday activity with those near and far, which is a benefit of modern technology...we can FaceTime and share joyful memories.  
• Negativity Detox.  This is all about clearing out negativity in your life.  Use this time to reflect on how you spend your time.  What do you watch?  What do you read?  What do you listen to? Who do you surround yourself with? What kind of conversations do you have?  If you take an honest look at these questions, what do you realize?  Are you surrounding yourself with positivity or negativity?  Make a conscious decision to limit the amount of negativity in your life.  I actually challenge you to a 7 Day Negativity Detox, where you only watch uplifting movies, series, documentaries; where you only read inspirational books and articles; where you only listen to uplifting podcasts or Audible books; where you do not engage in any negative conversations.   

Are you ready to accept the challenge to increase your joy level? 

Much love and light, LJ