Ordinary Joy

Where do we find the joy in our lives?
by Alison Bonds Shapiro, M.B.A. in Healing Into Possibility
Originally published online by Psychology Today

Joy is a wellspring. It’s not the same as happiness, although they are related. Joy is fundamental, a way of experiencing the world.

An action done with joy brings a sense of wellbeing. Doing anything this way is a sensory delight.

Something as simple as washing the dishes can brighten a day - watching the bubbles form, feeling the warmth of the water, the weight of the dishes in our hands. We can see the effect of joy if we compare the experience of doing dishes when we are joyful and doing dishes when we are annoyed. Doing the dishes, or anything else, with anger or resentment is a tense and irritating task. We wish we were anywhere else doing anything as long as it was more “important” than washing dishes.

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