Let The Good Times Roll
Do you have anyone in your life who talks about their past a lot? You know, the person who reminisces about all the good times they had and how wonderful life was ‘back then’? It’s wonderful to recapture good times and laugh at how things were. It makes for great conversation and warm moments.
But what about letting the good times roll into the present and the future? Are you keeping your best years behind you or are you creating new memories for years to come? It’s so important to keep your fun thoughts on present and future to continue the moment of a good life.
What do you have to look forward to? A vacation? A new venture? Maybe a new love? When we begin to envision our lives expanding into wonderfulness it keeps us young at heart and having a reason to be alive!
Start by taking a few moments and jotting down what it is you would like to create for yourself. Don’t judge, just write it all down. Then make a check list and begin exploring some of those things. Some call this a bucket list. It doesn’t have to be something huge. You can write down that you want to have a sleep over party with your friends (yes even adults have sleepovers!) Or join a hiking group. Think big and think small. If it inspires you and it feels like fun, then write it down. Maybe you will do them all or not but how fun will it be to try to complete your list.
Maybe you can even give it a name. For instance, many of us have heard of a vision board. What about calling this your ‘Joy Board’ filled with all the things you want to do for fun and to create memories.
Hopefully, even the thought of a joy board will have your good times roll into your NOW. Fun was not just meant for our youth or our past. Create anew everyday!
Enthusiastically,
Fran
Riding through discomfort
Most of us want to go in the direction of what we have envisioned, what we want for our lives. Most of us want to be happy, successful, and healthy. When we end up going where we don’t want to go, we assume something is wrong or someone made us take a wrong turn. Does that mean we are robbed of our joy? Does joy disappear when things seem “wrong”?
What if nothing’s wrong? What if joy is still breathing underneath, but life is designed to give us a few challenges so that we learn to navigate reality as the continuum of ebb and flow? What if it just takes something major to wake us up, to shake us up so we see how we were blocked from letting joy work for us?
It’s a humbling experience when we can climb out of the bottom of the hole, sit on the periphery and gaze over the big picture. By the same token, it can soothe our ruffled feathers and remind us that there is so much more going on in our galaxy than the issue with this person at work or that person at home. It’s then we can understand that our joy is still very much alive, using our daily experiences and challenges to expand. This awareness keeps makes us larger than our minds and lightens things up.
Can we see discomfort as a gift offering growth and something better? Bearing witness to that discomfort and how we respond (or react) can impede joy or welcome it in. Joy is out there regardless of whether or not we let it in. During the discomfort, we can trust that there is an ebb and flow to lead us to the other side. And on the other side, we will evolve and grow with more courage – because we held onto trust.
it’s a beautiful day (in the hospital)
This spring, I went to the hospital for some big-time surgery. When I awoke and learned that I didn’t have cancer – as my doctor thought I did (yee ha) – the recovery, even with several bumps in the road, became a great opportunity to practice turning up the volume on joy.
Getting up and walking around the day after having my belly sliced was a requirement for healing, but it wasn’t an easy thing. Somehow, re-writing the lyrics to Diana Ross’ I’m Coming Out and singing them each time I did (I’m getting … up. I’m inching off the bed, shufflin’ cross the floor … ) helped. Eating the pudding they served with lunch did too. (Hospital food is notoriously bad, but pudding is almost always good.)
Hospital Fun
A few days after being discharged, I wound in the emergency room with a high fever/infection. My sister went with me, and as we waited for tests, and then for the results (dragging on until the wee hours of the morning) she took photos on her cell phone commemorating the adventure. One of the residents looked in on us as we were giggling and snapping photos saying: You are far too upbeat for someone with a 102 fever. I replied: Doc, I don’t have cancer; this is nothing.
Later, waiting for an MRI on a gurney in a hallway, I heard U2 pumping out of a radiologists’ office: It’s a beautiful day … don’t let it get away, and I bobbed my head in a makeshift dance. An attendant gave me a quizzical look as he came to wheel me into the room. Dancing? he laughed. How can you resist this song? I replied. He slowed down, listened and said, Yeah, I guess it is a beautiful day.
Even though I wound up having to be admitted to the hospital for three more days to fight the infection, friends brought magazines, I listened to plenty of great music on my iPod, wrote out my gratitude in my journal… and ate plenty of pudding.
While I’m sure it would’ve been a whole lot harder to be joyful if the surgery had gone another way, or if the docs didn’t get to the bottom of the infection quickly, still, with this experience, I saw clearly that when the going gets tough, choosing to be goofy, upbeat and joy-filled really can be the sugar that makes the medicine go down.
( … now, don’t let it get away, this beautiful day …)
Taking My Foot off the Gas Pedal
Slow down, you move too fast.
You got to make the morning last.
Just kicking down the cobble stones.
Looking for fun and feelin’ groovy.
The 59th Street Bridge Song (Feeling Groovy) by Simon and Garfunkel
When I am driving somewhere that I have never been before, I have to admit, I can get anal about having to have directions to get there. Matt is the opposite, he is okay with having some kind of directions, trusting that we will eventually arrive at our destination.
This can be frustrated when you hold a belief that life is about the journey, not the destination. If that is so, then why are directions so darn important to me? It could be because I am such a visionary that without direction, I lose focus and travel round and round without making headway. Would it be so bad if I made a few “wrong turns” on my way to the next thing that I am creating in my life? It depends on the perspective that I choose.
If I end up going in a direction that is different than I anticipated, and I decide that it is an adventure, then the journey is enjoyable and I am open to possibilities. If I deem that turn to be wrong and I beat myself up about it, the first steps to choosing a less than joyful perspective have started and it is all downhill from there.
Enjoying the journey is a matter of noticing the perspectives that we get to choose each and every day. One of my life lessons is to slow down, so I can make the conscious choices that bring joy. When I am moving to fast, it is easy to make unconscious choices and wonder where the joy went.
Try taking your foot off of the gas today and choose the perspective that you want to see the world from. Enjoy the view and the journey.
The Joyful You
I realize that I put too much emphasis on other people to create joy in my life. The result of this is mostly disappointment; not in others, but in myself. I create high expectations of how I think things should be. I attribute this to the fact that I am a control freak, and I envision scenarios of perfection in my little mind, and like a movie, I wish for them to play out perfectly on the first take.
Since this rarely happens – and let’s be honest – it never happens, because who can actually read my mind? So let me rephrase – since this never happens, I have made a point to redirect these expectations toward myself because then if I let myself down, then I only have myself to blame.
Living inside my own head can be exhausting. I have debates with myself about whether or not I am being fair in my disappointments in others, and whether or not I am in fact being reasonable, it’s moot because I can’t rely on someone else the way that I can create for myself what I need in life.
Sometimes wh
en I get upset in a situation, I will scratch any plans I had for the remainder of that day, rent a tear-jerking chick flick, veg out on the couch and cry until my face hurts. While sometimes that is very cathartic, it’s not fair to myself. Why allow that outside factor to affect what I have going on inside me? Instead, I am learning to do things just to spite those negative situations. Something bad happens to me one day? So I’ll go to the gym and work out extra hard, because I know I’ll feel better. Instead of eating a pizza for dinner, I’ll go ahead with the fresh salad I had planned, because food won’t make me feel better – I will make myself feel better. Mind over matter. Only I can bring the joy to myself that I need and deserve.
Eventually I will fully be able to practice what I preach and only look to myself for my daily doses of joy. And when I do find it in outside sources, that will be an added bonus to what I’ve already got going.
Small Business Owner Finds Joy in the Creative Moments
Barry owns “The Filling Station” deli down the street. He makes a mean Cuban and my favorite egg salad and bacon sandwich. He’s a hard worker. In fact, most of the conversations we have are short and on the run, because as you know, small business can encompass most of your life.
But the other morning Barry came into the coffee shop right before opening, and we were able to have a slightly longer conversation. Barry was lit up, even before having his caffeine. That weekend he did something that allowed him to express his creativity and passion – he catered a nice dinner for just one couple celebrating their anniversary.
Barry talked about the menu items, the special requests from his client, the way he set the table and how he was able to ready the meal and leave the couple to be alone and enjoy their wonderful date. Barry described how the clients’ wife looked at her husband, and how that warmed his heart.
It was fun to see such enthusiasm on Barry’s face and hear such passion in his words – all because he was able to express his creativity. If we could all do that from time to time, we could really make a positive impact on the world around us with our joy.
Do you express your creativity through painting, song, writing, problem-solving, gardening or a wonderful meal? Figure out what lights your fire like Barry and be sure to make time to do it.
Joyful Revelation!
So here I am, freshly showered, feet aching and tired to the bone. An even better way to describe it would be “spent.” What a day. A full day at Universal Studios Islands of Adventure Theme Park. The Wizarding World of Harry Potter is open you know. And this is my niece’s 18th birthday and Hogwart’s is where she wanted to go. Whatever Mimi wants, Mimi gets. Don’t get me wrong – she is truly spoiled. But she’s not a brat. She’s earned everything she gets because she’s responsible, generous, loving, supportive and accountable. She’s a wonderful girl. And I’m so glad we came this weekend despite the 95 degree temperatures, the 98 percent humidity and the constant threat of rain. Not only did I have a wonderful time with my husband, my sister, her 2 kids and her 4-year old grandson, Felix, I officially moved into the world of “Grandparents.”
It was quite a revelation actually. And I’m not just talking about the fact that we were always walking well behind the younger folks. When you’re the parent, or the managing aunt as in my case, you’re the one who has to calm down the kids, keep them happy, carry them when they’re tired, coax them to stop whining, handle their tantrums and on and on and on. But all that’s changed now. See now there’s grown people between me and the 4-year old and I don’t have to do any of that responsible stuff anymore. I can just have fun, I can enjoy taking Felix on the rides, listen to the sound of his laughter, loving every moment of it. And as soon as I hear the slightest whimper, Dad takes over. It’s perfect. All the joy, all the love, all the laughter, none of the parenting.
With that kind of generational progress, can handing off hosting Thanksgiving dinner be far behind? Welcome to the next phase. I think I’m going to like it here.
The Power of Three Little Words
I have long been a student of quantum mechanics and understand well enough that everything is energy. I have seen What the @*#&$^ Do We Know? and Dr. Emoto’s studies on waters physical responses to certain phrases and pictures. I have read Louise Hay’s You Can Heal Your Life and regularly practice the Script from Karol Truman’s book Feelings Buried Alive Never Die. I have taken an energy Psychology class called Psych-K and done some self work utilizing the technique. I have had an energy healing performed on me by an Energy practitioner and more! I wholeheartedly believe that our Thoughts Create Things and that ultimately anytime we are not at-ease, that is to say “dis-eased”, there is simply a disruption of our energy.
Even though I have had all of these teachings and experiences, I must say I don’t know if I have ever had as moving of an experience as a video I watched this morning put together by Sivan Garr.
Watching the video this morning was pure pleasure. It was a truly remarkable experience. It was something that was so “simple”, but at the same time was such a profoundly JOYOUS experience that I have to share it with you too. It is the Joy Factor personified!!!
There is no doubt in my mind about our Universal Connection to one another after watching this video. And I firmly believe that the deepest of wounds in our society and in our world could be actually and truly be healed with these three little words. My fellow brothers and sisters, “I Love You!”
Grey is out. Gloom is Gone.
Does anyone else recall the glee when you opened a brand new box of crayons? Do you remember the smell? The perfect wrappers, the long unbroken sticks with the honed, flat, tapered point? Did you seek your favorite color first? For most of my working life, I’ve kept a full set of color markers or pencils on or near my desk. A coloring book of some kind is at hand – mandalas are my favorite. And when I have a few minutes, or need to change my state or take a break, I color.
I’ve loved fabric, paint and texture all of my life. From nail polish to make up, a gauzy floral skirt to a full-length wool cape, these elements of design still move me and make me swoon every day. They delight my senses, make my mouth water, and tickle my spirit. I learned to sew at the age of nine, to crochet in my teens, took up needlepoint in college, and learned to knit on my first lecture tour in New Zealand. (How could I be in a country with 80 million sheep and not learn to knit?) Handwork is a meditation to me, as the luscious yarn glides through my finders, developing a form and personality as I work, yet it also a social focus, as I can “pass the time of day” with others as I create.
The element of design common to all of these—fiber, paint and texture—is color, and I was blessed early on to find a way to use this passion to make my way through the world. I cannot explain the elation that comes when I find the perfect colors and finishes for a space, or what a charge it is to see it—often months later—in real life on installation day. Sometimes I just have to sit and drink in the room and sigh with pleasure, wondering what stories the room will hold in a few years—the events, emotions and gleanings of the souls that will live there.
Color is free energy. The cost for color vs. non-color is usually nil, but the boost that comes from the right color for the right application is a bonus . . . a gift from the Universe. While it is merely a refraction or reflection of LIGHT, the impact is huge, and it gives me great joy. It’s akin to eating canned corn when fresh corn is available: why settle for gray when you can have pink, coral, teal, lime, or sage?
I love this video. It makes my soul smile, from hair roots (uncolored) to my toenails (usually colored). http://www.letscolourproject.com/blog/2010/05/dulux-walls-global-film-launched-2/
Carpe diem
Rebecca
Firsts
Not seconds, not thirds, FIRSTS.
The joy I felt the first time I went scuba diving.
The first time I spoke to a large audience.
The first time I felt kundalini rush up my spine.
The first time I got naked on a beach. Happy Happy, JOY JOY!
The first time I sailed on the ocean.
The first time I opened to love.
The first time a taught a tantra workshop.
The first time I roasted a chicken (successfully).
I relish in the opportunity to create firsts, in my life and in others. Really, is there anything like the ‘first time’? Not to say that I don’t find joy in continuity and learning an art, or trying things again and again. Lets face it, some things only get better after the 3rd or 4th time. Somethings take years to master or perfect, however, most of us will never forget ‘the first time’.
My self care lately has included consciously choosing joy in the moment, based on the belief that the future begins from the present. Example, a friend of mine told me about a band playing at Smiths Ole Bar, and expressed that she thought I would really like the music. I love to dance, and my favorite sounds fall in the funk category. Percussion and Brass – YUM! To use the words of another Joy Posse Blogger… my ‘killjoy voice“ popped in and said, ”YUK! Don’t go, it is a smokey, dank bar, and you’ll smell of smoke, your clothes will smell, and you hate that … don’t go! “ So, in that moment… I said, does not going bring me joy, or should a push past that and would going bring my joy? Here is were mother intuition and a little step child irony chimed in. I asked my friend, what is the name of the band? She replied, ”The Pimps of Joy Time“! HA!!!
I went out that night and danced my but off, came home, put the smelly clothes right into the wash, took a shower to get the funk out of my hair, and went to bed with a big grin on my face! A first for me.
Its Joy TIME!
Cheers
Tracey
The Joy Factor
Welcome fellow Happiness Pioneers! You've come to the right place if you are looking to raise your Joy Factor and create a life you are madly in love with. My vision is for everyone to live a life aligned with their passions and full of joy. Visit often to read what the Joy Posse has to say, watch uplifting videos and gather other delightful resources that will make you smile. This is also a place to share what raises your Joy Factor - do tell! Let’s have the ripple effect of joy change the world!
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