Reflections on a Year of Seeking Joy

A year ago today, I wrote about my coming in to finding my theme for the year: Seek joy. You know that old adage of things being easier said than done? Yeah, well it turns out that applied to this as well...in a lot of ways. Nevertheless, I think it's still worth reflecting on how this all went and what I gained from it.

First off, similar to other years when I had a certain theme, I found that the word "joy" kept popping up everywhere -- on signs, books (see my previous post re: Mary Oliver), even in Brene Brown's Netflix special ("The Call to Courage"). Maybe I was just paying more attention to it because it was my theme, but I still can't help but think it was somewhat serendipitous, just a little.

Second, I came into contact with the phrase "The Devil's working overtime." You ever have a goal in mind and it just seems like so many obstacles get thrown in your way to keep you from accomplishing it? That's basically what happened during the first part of this year. I aimed to seek joy and I kept finding stress, sadness, and heartache. Work was awful, my dating life sucked, and then to top it off my grandmother died before a third of the year was through. Devil. Working. Overtime.

And then, after not even being halfway through the year, my wallet was stolen. While I was in the midst of a very joy filled conversation about my sense of calling in life, no less. Fuck. But, strangely, this was a turning point. Because it was on that day, before said wallet was stolen, that I had resolved to start a gratitude journal. One of the points Brene Brown made in her talk was that people who are joyful all share one thing in common -- gratitude. So I decided to start making lists in a journal, as often as I could. And it just so happens that it started on the day I felt the most vulnerable, violated, and helpless.

What's interesting is that I didn't feel forced to start the journal even after what happened that day. Instead, it was because of what happened that I felt even more motivated to start it, because I had so much to be grateful for. Everything from the sun shining on my face that morning to the above mentioned conversation, from the staff at the cafe who were so helpful and generous to recognizing everything I already had, despite what I had lost. This was the beginning of what I see now as my life long journey of seeking joy.

No, I haven't been perfect with my gratitude journal, nor have I suddenly transformed into a semi-permanent happy and joyful person. Dude, sometimes life just sucks. It's hard to be joyful in such a hurting world. It's hard to be joyful when you've had a bad day or when you're reminded of what you don't have...or when your cat decides to attack your arm when all you want to do is cuddle with her. (Sorry, I digress...) But what I have noticed is the difference I experience when I do write down what I'm grateful for, even if it's just five things. I feel calmer and less cynical. I'm not minimizing my own struggles or the pain that I and/or those in the world experience, either. I just feel more balanced and less stuck. Maybe that's part of what joy looks like.

Joy is an option, just like anything else. But it takes work to choose it, because to do so is to be more vulnerable. There's no risk when you're feeling cynical and bitter...you're protected then. But to have joy is to risk having it be taken away. Then again, maybe that's why  what's underlying the joy is gratitude -- the recognition of the fact that life is fleeting, so it's important to enjoy what we already have right now. But it's not based in fear or anxiety, either.

One of the things I most often write down in my lists is my cat, Ashley (even when she's been a pain in the butt or bites me without cause). I mention her because, for one, I am truly grateful to have her as my companion, but also because I know that, someday, I won't have her anymore. I know someday I'll miss not telling her for the 100th time to get off the counter, or I'll miss not hearing her little bell or her meow throughout the house. I know it sounds so cliche or insignificant, but I truly think this is what gratitude can look like to an extent.

Seeking joy isn't about seeking that next high or extraordinary event (though I have to say that meeting one of my favorite poets and theologians, Padraig O Tuama, and seeing a live recording of On Being with Krista Tippet and Shane Claiborne, were definitely some highlights for the year). It's about the ability to stay present and recognize the good that already exists, in whatever form that takes. And yes, sometimes it is about seeking out those experiences that will give us a sense of happiness and belonging, especially when doing so causes our comfort zones to be expanded. Overall, though, it's taking in the good, no matter how fleeting, and giving thanks. It's so simple, but so challenging, especially in this consumer culture of ours where we're constantly told we're not enough or we don't have enough or we don't have enough of the right things. It really is like seeking out a high, and it's probably one of the reasons why we're often so unhappy in our romantic partnerships -- we're hooked on the dopamine of romance instead of being committed to the people we're choosing.

Joy isn't dopamine or some permanently happy state that can't be taken away. Joy is a choice, and it's a state of being. It's a practice of gratitude. It's a practice, period. For most of us, anyway. I came into this year hoping to seek joy, and I found it. Over and over and over. I found other things, too -- loss, pain, sadness, heartache, stress, depression, rejection. But I think the important thing was that I was able to recognize what joy can look like and how to integrate it more into my life. So, it is in this way, that I will always be seeking joy.

Where I Meet You

You are the one that I meet in the sacred places ---

In the cool shaded woods where ancient pillars have erupted from the earth,

And singular notes from bird's song echo as if in a hallowed cathedral,

And the soft sweeping sound of a brook's dancing 

Over stones can be heard as an eternal whisper;

Under a wondrous night sky where infinity could not be better explained
Than in the silent staring back
Of thousands of eyes that have long since closed 

Before our beginning;

Within the cavernous wombs of vaulted ceilings holding ---

And nearly bursting from --- 

The limitless words poured forth in hushed petitions and shouts of praise

To that which still remains unknown;

In a flock of starlings at twilight, moving together as one heaving, breathing,

Miraculous organism;

Between the lines of a poem that read like a prayer;

Within the notes of a song that seems to have always existed inside of me;

In the rooms of the dying and the tombs of the dead

With air hanging heavy from all that remains

Unspoken.

You are the one with whom I can exist in the spaces without words.

But you are not to be encountered in the everyday of living ---

The morning routine of awakening,

The preparations made for the predictable day ahead,

The simplistic reporting of what we experienced when out of each others' sight . . .

Your body I will never know in the act of

Folding & enfolding

Of skin together in a playful dance.

Yet when I stand in the space where time stands still

And stillness falls over me like water,

Where the infinite becomes visible amongst the finite objects

Of our existence,

And I can do nothing but do nothing

And breathe . . .

I can say with clear knowing:

You are here  

You are here. 

Reasons

Because I was tired from a long day

Because your dad died

Because I had only just discovered my grandmother was dying

Because the energy from yet another one of his emails was too much

Because fluctuations in hormones are a thing

(Google it)

Because absence may not always make the heart grow fonder

Because finding someone as available as you was 

terrifying 

in all the subconscious ways

Because maybe you were so used to being mistreated
that I scared you too with my
emotional softness

Because swipe culture

Because us both being empaths meant we absorbed each others efforts 

to be ok when 

maybe we weren't

Because the dancing didn't move our souls

Because maybe you never fully outgrew the schoolboy belief that
chemistry is about big reactions
instead of noticing 

the slow, subtle changes of molecules dancing and bonding to form 

something new

Because maybe we opened up too quickly and devoured too readily 

that not much else was left 

to be discovered

Because I felt it as soon as I tried to hold you close

Because I knew immediately after our lips met for the last time 

that it was the last time...

Still...

I'll never fully understand why...

Felicity or For Mary

If you read my previous post, you would know that my intended theme for the year is "Seek joy." Not quite three weeks in and, like most people attempting to complete their new year resolutions, I found it more difficult than I anticipated. I felt depressed, I was more tearful (for reasons not always completely clear), I was unhappy with the direction of my life, I experienced a loss, etc. Joy seemed to have evaporated almost as soon as the idea to seek it had occurred to me.

And then, Mary Oliver died. I've been a fan of almost anything I had read of hers, but not an avid one. I did not own any of her works, even though I had told myself numerous times that needed to change. So today I resolved, barring too many others having the same idea, to finally correct this error in my personal library. Little did I know what would be waiting for me on that shelf...

Felicity. As in synonymous with joy. I sought Mary and I found joy...Mary's joy. Because of course I did! This revelation sparked something within me, and a poem found its way into my consciousness which could not be contained. So I did what anyone would do with something like that...I released it. Here it is.

I started out the year
As most do
With intention.
I hoped to will myself
To seek the good, the positive, the sacred
That is involved in everyday living.
But this joy was not so easily 
Come by
And I found myself overwhelmed
With waves of dullness, despair, and despondency.
It was much like trying to gulp down 

Single droplets of water
While still dying of thirst.
Then, not long into the imagined newness,
I heard of your going and the news hit me -- 
Not with a sharp blow -- 
But a soft sigh.
Ahhh! You have gone to join that which you sought to bring 
To us...
The heart of God.
I knew then that I wanted 
(Needed)
To hold some piece
Of you -- 
Something of which to return to again and again
As often as the changing seasons within me.
So out I went searching,
Only to find you waiting patiently as if to say
"Here have I been all along."
Now, as I hold this part of you that was released into the world,
With its stanzas beautiful and brief,
I say, "Come, my friend, and pierce my soul with your blade so
Light...
And let us see what will become of this brief and sacred life."