Pardon me while I tangent.
Recently I was working away from home for a few days and while away was gifted with a crappy weather day. While to most this would sound like a curse, to me it was truly a gift. A gift that allowed me permission to sit on my butt and spend an entire glory-full afternoon doing nothing but reading a book. Delicious! The book I happened upon was sitting on the desk in my sweet friend’s home, and being it was right out in the open I picked it up and went to reading.
The book, “Joyful, Anyway” led me through untangling the process around creating a more joyful life.
Exhausting.
The plight of this social experiment to constantly create a more joyful life, for me, is simply this;
There is this constant societal expectation to be pursuing and living and finding joy, but how do we do that in the midst of all the busyness of WORK and commuting and connecting and loving and worrying and figuring out how to be enough for everybody and everything and still I’m supposed to find time to cultivate more joy.
What if it’s OK to let Joy be the last thing on my mind? What if I just get up and focus on everything else and let go of this idea that I am “supposed to” be living my “best life”?
What happens when we stop hustling to create our great selves or our most Divine version of us, or discovering what sings the songs of our soul? When the fuck do we have time for that stuff? What if it’s all too much to ask and it’s all about materialism and capitalism and hustle culture and really we’re not supposed to be searching for anything or cultivating more of anything and really maybe we’re just supposed to be chopping wood and carrying water; Attending to the moment to moment day-to-day shit that needs to get done because if it doesn’t something will actually for real fall apart.
Maybe we just start there and when that feels somewhat manageable, then maybe I can stretch and ask for a little bit more or a little bit different than just “the day to day.” Maybe if I can just take a minute and settle in with what needs to happen, then I can spend less time thinking and wondering about what I am supposed to want to make happen.
Maybe.
Maybe there needs to be more time to rest, or focus on just what is in our hands at any given moment and maybe there, right there, is joy. Maybe joy is simply showing up, present in the moment and not striving to fill any proverbial cup, or make something from what feels like nothing when we’re just trying to keep up.
Joy, for me, is the time to sit and drink my morning coffee staring out the window, because usually I’m drinking it during my first client meeting. Joy is a cruddy weather day that gives me the excuse to stay inside and read a book ALL DAY. Start to finish! Joy for me is the time to bake bread, or let bolognese sit and simmer all day. It’s playing outside with my garden and not caring if all the weeds get pulled because the veggies don’t need zero competition, they just need a chance. Less perfection and more room for what is “real life”.
There, somewhere in the cracks in the sidewalk I can find it, not because I am working to cultivate it, but because I am NOT making it one more thing I am falling short on, in the midst of all the other things.
I’m curious about your thoughts and feelings about this and so please reach out and let me know. I can not be the only one!
There, thank you for letting me rant.
Forever the journey, Anne