Last January, those are the last two words I thought I’d ever write about, and today, ten months later, they are dominating my thoughts. For the longest time I used those two words interchangeably. Many times over this ten month journey they have shown up separately. Just what is the difference?
Every morning at approximately 7:20 my husband texts me “Good morning”. When I answer him, I’ll know he’ll be calling me, so I get settled with my tea and turn down the tv. We have a nice 30 minute chat as he drives to work. (He uses a hands free blue tooth device, and we have one of those Cape Cod commuter marriages, where one spouse works off cape for four days and comes home on weekends).
This morning, when his text plinked my phone, the word “joy” just sprung up. It dawned on me his call brings joy to my day. I also get joy from going to my yoga class. I get joy from coming home to my simple lunch and newspaper. I get joy from spending this hour in my chair, reading or writing, while the soap operas play in the background. I get joy that the soap operas are like spending a bit of time remembering my mom. Her and I sat day after day, right up to her last day in the hospital, watching them together. I learned joy can spring from loss. I learned joy springs from the tiniest mundane things I do and see each day. I learned that joy is not fleeting. Joy is sustained, day after day, as the thread that knits my life together.
Happiness is fleeting. I get a bit of good news, or a nice email, and a happy feeling spikes for a moment or a day. Happiness is a feeling that cannot be sustained. Happy moments are surprises and blessings God sprinkles my days with. But joy….ah, joy….joy is sustenance for the spirit. Joy is there in everything God manifests in my life. It is not a feeling. Even when I feel sad or upset, joy is present underneath. Joy is not a high or a low. It just is.
Learning the difference between the two has be one of the most valuable things to come out of this journey. To be at this point, finally, where I can find joy in remembering loss, is perhaps the most freedom I have experienced in a long, long, time. Don’t seek happiness. Happy things are the pop-ups in life – and then they fade. Seek joy. Look to your higher power and ask to be taken on a journey seeking joy. But be ready – because if you ask, you shall receive and the road to experiencing true joy, the sustainable kind, isn’t always the yellow brick one. As wonderful as joy is, sometimes it can only be achieved through struggle, but it is always worth it.
And so, as another day goes by, I must go outside and start up my tractor and experiencing the joy found in vacuuming leaves, and ….I have written.
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