Joy
Joy. What is joy? How would you describe joy? How does joy differ from happiness?
One of my favorite poets is Jane Oliver an American Pulitzer prize-winning poet who wrote this poem:
“If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy, don’t hesitate.
Give in to it.
There are plenty of lives and whole towns destroyed or about to be.
We are not wise, and not very often kind.
And much can never be redeemed.
Still, life has some possibility left.
Perhaps this is its way of fighting back,
that sometimes something happens better than all the riches or power in the world.
It could be anything,
but very likely you notice it in the instant when love begins.
Anyway, that’s often the case.
Anyway, whatever it is, don’t be afraid of its plenty.
Joy is not made to be a crumb.”
Do you allow yourself to have joy? To embrace it, own it, maybe even expand it.
I was having lunch with my daughter at a restaurant where a baby who an was seated at an adjacent table connected with my smile. I began to play peek-a-boo with him.
He cracked up in laughter as my face disappeared behind my napkin and then suddenly popped back up. In this moment I felt joy. The joy came from communicating not with words but with smiles and laughter. For me joy is being silly.
