Tip: Seek joy
A coaching tip for everyday magic
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Joy is not a luxury. It’s a strategy. The more devastating the news, the more tempting it is to fall into despair and wrap yourself into a blanket. That’s ok (I make generous use of my favorite blanket these days), but you can’t stay there for too long. Humans have built-in negativity bias, and that’s why the news, too, has negativity bias. When you recognize that, it makes more sense to use joy as a re-balancing strategy.
Focusing your attention on what brings you joy every day, even if it’s a small thing like a cup of tea, is a way of re-balancing your nervous system so that you can think more clearly, and make better choices about how to respond to both what’s going on in front of you and also what’s going on far from you, say, in your state and federal government offices.
My personal view is that art making and community rituals have always served this purpose. The dance tradition I have studied the most, social tango, is a tradition of sad songs about loss and despair. But social dancing is not actually sad. It’s joyful. Its purpose isn’t to wallow in sadness; it’s to move through it, literally, and possibly even to transform it.
Joy helps keeps your imagination alive. When you enjoy a cupcake or a sunset or a hug, that’s a feeling in your body. When you have good feelings on a regular basis, your system tunes itself more and more toward activities and experiences and ideas that feel similar. This is why imagining the kind of world you want to live in, even if it seems far away, is at the core of any social movement. Beyond resistance to the unwanted thing is replacement with something better.
Imagination pulls you forward and makes each step incrementally easier and more clear. It also draws people who share a vision together, like water droplets. For an even more powerful practice, seek joy with others.
A few journaling prompts to seek joy:
I feel joy when I think about _______
A beautiful thing I appreciate is _______
Right now it would feel good to _______
Right now my body needs _______
A few journaling prompts to link big picture with small picture
In the world I want to live in, I see _______
Right now, a few actions I can take that look similar are _______
In the world I want to live in, I feel ________
Right now, a few actions I can take that feel similar are _______
If you’d like to learn more about how coaching can help you develop affirming daily practices like this one, or if you would like support with a personal or professional challenge, please reach out for a private consultation.
Lovely!