Ep. 6: How to cultivate Joy as a practice

**This transcript is created with Otter.Ai and has not yet been edited for flow and reading ease. Please read with grace.

Hello, friends. I'm AJ, the joy weaver. Okay, so this episode of our podcast, I thought about doing how to listen to your intuition, but I want to save that for next time, because here's what happens when we listen to our inner critic and we start doing that work is either or like, Oh, that was easy, or we're like, oh, this is everywhere. This is tainting everything. Oh, my gosh, I didn't realize. Like, it almost becomes this extra burden sometimes to realize you can talk back and then have that responsibility.

And when we take on the extra responsibility of, okay, I have this ability now to respond to my inner critic, to work through my thoughts in a new way. It can almost be a little draining sometimes to be like but I already did my workout, and I have to deal with these other people, and I have to, like, brush my teeth and do the dishes, and now I've got, do you see what I'm saying? So I thought today we would talk about ways to cultivate joy. And I get this question a lot, how do you cultivate joy? What is it?

AJ, it's easy for you because you run, honey, this is true and also not true. And I think we forget that everything is a practice and everything is cultivatable. Cultivatable, yeah, so here are some of my best tips. Take what works, leave what doesn't. If you have ideas, please put them in the comment or, like, send me an email and I'll add them to the next episode. But if you're like, none of this would work for me.

A, not everything works for everybody. And B, I am. I would bet good money that at least one thing on this list would be helpful. My question for you is, what's coming up that you're immediately dismissing, that you don't get any joy? What's here that's saying you're not allowed to feel that openness of possibilities and hope, even if things have been hard and big and crazy and wild, that doesn't mean you don't get goodness too. It doesn't mean you're cut off for the rest of your life. This isn't Pitch Perfect, where you're on the rooftop and then they're like, nope, next. Done. Forever. My friend is there, if this is you, could we bring in 2% of possibility that if you're listening to this, that there's something here for you? So if so stay, keep listening, and if you're like, AJ, my sleeves are rolled up. I've got my journal. I'm ready. I'm taking notes.

Okay, well, let's dive in. Okay, so cultivating joy, first off, I'm going to say this, and you're going to roll your eyes, and yet it's true. There's a reason why people say gratitude all of the time, because gratitude reframes our mind, our bodies, our energy. It just works. It works even more if you write it down. Works even more if you write down in pencil, and you're like, Yeah, but I don't like journaling.

I hear you. So let's have a moment about that, because sometimes we're talking about journaling, and people are like, Yeah, but it takes so long, and then I get worried about what is the right thing to write. I'm a trash journal. I'll throw anything in my journal.

I've got a petty thing that I'm angry about this one person at the grocery store. Cool. It goes in my journal. I'm wondering what I need to do next week, and if I'm doing anything right in the world, but that also goes down. I'm like, oh, I need to buy new bracelet, because I broke butter. It goes down everything. It's just a brain dump. So let's scoot past just choo choo choo trash the dear diary. And today, on the 19th day of March, I went to the store and, like, we don't have to do a fancy journaling. You don't even need a fancy pen. I use, like, $1 journals from the store.

I do like the I think they're like, g7 pilot pens. They just write nicely, but you don't have to be fancy about it. So if we've got hangups from past journaling, put it in the Notes app of your phone, or just put it on a post it note. I think we've talked about this on the podcast. I can't remember. Maybe we'll have to talk about this. But the access point, the bar for journaling, if it's high, be like, Oh, okay, how can we lower that? How can we make it more accessible for you to do something in a new way?

And if you're like, Yeah, but that's hard. Remember, everything is a practice, and sometimes we have to take baby steps. So if the next step of journaling feels too big, what's a smaller step? Scratch piece of paper. Printer paper. Cool. Jot down a list you're gonna make your to do list. Cool. Make like, a little gratitude list. 10 feels too much cool. What's one? What's two? Can you put it in a group chat with some friends and be like, Okay, I'm trying this challenge. This weird girl, AJ, she's got blue hair. I don't know it's a bit much. She told me to send you guys for one week.

Try, just for one week, see what happens. Five things I'm grateful for, and we're not doing the sky, the house, the marriage, those things are great. They're great. I want you to look for the little things that light you up, that you're. Like, oh my goodness, I got a spiced chai latte, and it was so good. That's some like, tangible gratitude, like that moment where we're sinking into it, where we're feeling it. Does that make sense? Or, Oh, I wore my layers. Stay in my outfit.

I just felt like me something specific in the last 24 hours, because what we're doing is we're almost like, capturing it. If you've ever heard people be like, Oh my gosh, this year's gone so fast, which I literally said yesterday, because I couldn't believe that it was the 28th No, today's 20 this happened this morning. It's like, how has so much time gone by? But as we get older, there's less new memories happening, less big moments. So time actually compresses. It's like a memory storage thing. You can look up the science. It's actually pretty cool. So when we're younger, we're experiencing so many new things, and our brain is like, oh, gotta remember this, oh, I've gotta remember that. Oh, I've gotta remember this, which is why we remember so much.

And then as we get older, we're like, Man, if I try to even remember all the things I did when I was 25 I don't know. I don't know. Just kind of a 20s kind of blur together. Does that make sense? And so when we pause to take in the gratitude, it's less about the gratitude and more how it rewires your brain to look for the goodness. Because A and I think Rachel Hollis said this a long time ago, but so have a lot of people a when you know you're gonna share a gratitude list, or you know you're gonna write one, you're automatically already looking for what you want to write down during the day, so your eyes are already, like, on alert in a good way. You're training for goodness, right? It's a practice.

You're gonna get so sick of me saying that, but, like, it's true, so moving on. Write down your gratitude list. Share it with people. It doesn't have to be long. Or story just I got a new candle and it smells really good, or I took extra time in the shower today afterwards, and I put on this lotion. Y'all, this lotion smells so good, I'm it's the little things, right? But what happens is, then you have 10 micro moments of joy throughout your day. So even if it was raining, you're like, Oh man, and this happened, and this happened, and then this happened, and then I got to pet my dog, and we went on a walk, and, like, that was really cool. And there's buds on the trees, and that's great. You might sound like a toddler that's like, oh my gosh, and then, but like that enthusiasm and that joy that's contagious, and it's also contagious for you, even if you're like, This feels fakey, okay, but it's what, yeah, a practice.

Okay, so gratitude is your first one, your second one kind of links into that. This is screenshots, like mental screenshots. So if you've ever hung out with me for, I don't know, more than a day, or maybe even a day, actually, maybe even a couple hours, details, you may have seen me lean back, look at the sky and just take a big sigh, or just like, I've maybe, like, put my hands out and just like, looks around with just this like, look on my face of like, awe. It's because I'm mentally taking a screenshot of this memo, of this memory of this moment, to have a memory in the future to be like, Wow. This is the goodness. Look how neat. I remember doing this in Germany. We were at like, a wine tour tasting, and it was man, I think it was August, maybe, and it was just greenery.

Everywhere we were with people we loved. Sun was setting, and I had my hands out, and I was like, this, this, we are living. And my friend came up. She's like, What are you doing? I explained it. She's like, I love that. And then she put her hands out, and she kind of did it too. But it doesn't have to be a whole thing with your hands out like it doesn't. You don't have to be like, I don't want to tell anybody I'm doing this. I don't want to look weird. Just pause and mentally say, I want to remember this, even if you don't say it out loud.

And then take three seconds and just kind of scan, like a lifeguard scans, you know, a pool you're scanning the place you're in to almost make a 360 photo. When I do this a I'm pausing so my parasympathetic nervous system, I'm getting slow enough that my body's like, Oh, we're safe. So even if I've been excited, I'm like, okay, oh, we gotta go do this. And they're like, man, look at this. I don't even know if you can feel how much my energy just shifted between we gotta go. And this is so great and, oh, but I feel it in my body. It's just like the settling in that happens that we get hyper present, because sometimes we're rushing forward, or we're like, oh, and I forgot, like we're behind.

So those moments where we can come and be super present, hyper present, are game changers, because we realize we're actually safe in that moment, even if we don't feel safe because greater world things or XYZ, or we got homework due or business thing or conflict, and Outside world, if we come into that moment, oh, this is cool. This is cool. This is good. I am safe. I am loved, I'm held. It's allowing that to sink in, in that moment, and then you have that memory that you can tap into later. If you were at kp with me, you I said this, oh, man, I don't even know, every 30 seconds, every 30 minutes, I was so excited.

I was just like, wow, look at the goodness. This is so cool. Okay, so that goes into the next one, which is, if you see something, say something. And so often we hear about this with like, bad things, if you see somebody robbing somebody say something, and we see somebody acting up say something, you know, and it's like reverse narking, I guess. And the reason why this is cool is because, okay, I might sound whatever. If you're listening this podcast, you either know me or you appreciate this. Not everybody looks at the world the same way I do when I'm in this space where people don't see the world the same way I do and I point out beauty. Sometimes they are surprised, and sometimes they're like, Oh, I love that too. And then sometimes they'll start doing it too. This is a ripple, and sometimes people aren't used to it. They're like, Oh, okay, but this is about you.

We cannot change or control other people, much to many people's disappointment and many people's attempts. But when you say something out loud, a you're marking it in your brain that, hey, this is something we're saying, we're claiming. We're seeing words have power, words or spells, words are life or death, right? The whole thing tracks. So when you point out the beauty for people to look at, including yourself, you're bringing more attention to it, right? Like, what is it? Energy flows, where focus goes something like that, or tension goes. But if you're like, wow, the way that this candle is flickering is just That's so neat.

I love that. The way they're able to do that, people might have 10 other things going on, and then they hear that, and they're like, Oh, that's cool, that she noticed that, right? Or, Oh, my grandma gave me that candle. A, it can be a conversation opener. B, it's another pause moment of looking for beauty and training your eye to see it and see you're bringing goodness to the table. How often in our friendships and our conversations, we're complaining about the weather, we're complaining about this, or we're complaining about all the things going wrong, right?

We can have a laundry list, but when are you bringing the good things? When are you bringing the good things? Like the Facebook or like, oh my gosh, it's all drudgery, okay? But like, Are you sharing goodness? Barbara, are you contributing to goodness? Are you because if not, then maybe we have a chance to ask a question of if we would like to do things differently. We can remember how we talked about last time. We can change the way we're wired. It takes practice, it takes effort, but it's worth the effort, because also the adrenaline in your body is going to be different. I just it's easier and harder. What is it? Just because it's simple doesn't mean it's easy, but it's so worth it, because it makes everything lighter and easier to digest.

Instead of just a laundry list of bat which, like, some of that stuff is going to be there, we got systemic stuff up the wall that's just like, what what, you know, and if we can bring some goodness in the conversation, then it's like, what is it? Girl worth fighting for? It's like, life worth fighting for. If we don't have anything worth fighting for, what's the point? We gotta look for it.

We gotta claim it. We gotta name it. And when you see it out loud, you're inviting other people into it as well. This also looks like when somebody's maybe energy has shifted, or somebody did something really great. I keep coming back to the KP conference because I'm still not over it, but there were people who gave speeches or workshops that I was like, that was astounding. Like, that was amazing. I loved it. And they're like, really, like, when you see people thriving or doing really cool things, say something.

Tell them if somebody holds the door, like, thank you or a waitress is is super lovely and helpful. Like, man, I really appreciate you. Like, that extra gratitude, it might seem excessive, but honestly, that extra zest, I guess, which is funny, because I guess that's my call sign, zesty. Um, is it changes things. Just try it. Just try it.

Because the way people look at you changes. When you are the person who says something, there's an appreciation, therefore, yeah, that is cool. That is. Nice. Oh, I didn't notice that. It's not a Are we better than them or not? It's just a different lens of looking at the world that is trainable. All of this comes down to it's trainable. It's Alignable. Okay? The next one also ties in. I love I wrote these out of order, but they're tying together nicely. Fan girl, your friends, I think I mentioned this previously, Jen Hatmaker said this, and it has stuck with me. And I think about it all the time. You can fan girl band, maybe you're like, man, blink 182 isn't my jam, or Modest Mouse, or Christina Aguilera, okay, obviously all my band thoughts are in the 2000s but um, you fan girl.

And you know these facts and you know these things, but she's like, everybody, she's an author that I adore. And she's like, everybody, get fan girls about me and my stuff. She's like, I got my friends. She's like, I'm glad you guys are my readers and that you're interacting with all my stuff. But like, use that energy. Go fan girl, your friends, your friends are doing some really cool things. They're doing some cool stuff. So go celebrate your friends. Go share their stuff.

Go like, post, write them a note, like, all the stuff, fan girl or people. And I was, yes, yes, this is the goodness. And so when you speak life, when you speak goodness into your friends, the things you're noticing, they light up, like whole ass Christmas trees, or, like, I don't know fireworks or like the night sky. Oh my gosh, in Namibia, when we went back in college, and it would be night out, and the sky looked just like a velvet, like black velvet with diamonds in it. It was astounding.

Gosh, it's one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen in my life. Coming back, um, totally lost my train of thought, oh, people light up. People look as beautiful as nature, and it's just fullness. Does that make sense? Like you can be happy but radiant. Tell your friend something true and beautiful that you're seeing in them, and watch them glow. People are lightning bugs, if you know how to turn them on, not always in that way. I mean, you can you want to thank all your friends in that way. But, um, sorry, mom. Anyways. Um, I mean, when you speak to people's souls and they feel seen, people light up, people light up.

And this goes also for your spouse and the other frame of you know or your partner, your lover, like when you speak goodness to them, they also turn on, turn up right, and that lightness brings that intimacy, brings that goodness. Intimacy is not just sex. Intimacy is the closeness that souls share, right, that hearts feel seen and safe to be together. Yeah, that's just your dare. Go tell somebody what you think about them in a good way, don't we're not doing the enemy. Sing today. This is joy podcast. This is with the joy Weaver, not the revenge Weaver. Anyways, I just have a whole visual revenge weaving anyways, just try it.

See what happens when you want to give that compliment, but you're like, oh, I don't want to be weird. I dare you speak up. I've had people cry on me because they're like, really, you see that? And like, Yeah, you don't. And they're like, I mean, I think about it sometimes, but I'm like, oh, that the imposter syndrome is real across the board. For so many people, I know people who make, like, seven figures in here, six figures, like, lots and lots of money, who still have imposter syndrome.

I know people who wrote books and have imposters. Like, sometimes we think people are super confident and they're like, oh, they wouldn't appreciate, I don't know a single author that does not appreciate getting messages in their inbox saying, Hey, here's what your book did for me, or here's what I love. This is going with your friends. But I'm just saying, like, sometimes we think some people won't want it because XYZ. And I'm just saying that's a lie. Everybody appreciates being told some goodness, so don't hold back.

And also, the way they light up, you'll light up. It ripples. It ripples in such a cool way. It's just the coolest. So try it and then report back. Come back to my comment section, send me an email, let me know how it goes. Because you might, you might be surprised, and it's a little addicting, to be honest, because then I feel like I'm like, a pied piper. I'm like, throwing out candy. Because people are like, AJ, and I'm like, Hey, how's it going? How are you feeling? Tell me something good. And they're like, Oh my gosh. Nobody's asked me that lately.

Like, just, yeah, okay, I'm not gonna keep feeding a dead horse. It's not a dead horse, but I'm just here for trying. So often we get so nervous about trying something new because we don't want to be embarrassed or feel silly, but literally, we will feel silly when we try something new because it's new. Have you ever tried chopsticks? You know, when the first couple times you tried chop, you're like, I don't even know how many what? And then other people pick it up, super easy, and you're like, how are you doing? Like, I. Some things come easier than others, and that's okay. That's okay because it's a practice. Okay. This next one's from Melanie ann layer.

And I love, love this reference, and she said it in a couple of different calls and different stuff. And she's a mentor of mine that I just really adore the way she shares. So you know how people are like, I don't know what I want, but I don't want to be sad, I don't want to be disappointed, I don't want to be let down, or I don't want to be whatever. And we want to move towards what's good. And so often we're focused on what we don't want, because we're like, I've just been stuck in the mire, just I want to get out of the mud. Okay, cool, but where do you want to go? And sometimes we're like, I don't know, just not mud. And that can be an okay starting place, but eventually you got to know where you want to go, right?

So like, where shoot your shot, claim, claim the goods, and she has this idea of a dartboard, right? If you're like, Okay, I'm aiming for a thriving, sustainable business that pays me to travel the world, speak out events and retreats, help run LARPs and be a hype woman for people living their best lives in their full, radiant selves, right? That's a dartboard I can move towards clearly, if I'm just like, I don't know, I just don't want to be miserable, and I don't want to have a nine to five and I don't want to stay second one place forever. That's like a different dart board. She calls it a stinky dart board. And so if you're throwing at the I just don't want a nine to five. I don't want to things like, it's even if you hit that dartboard, it might not be things that light you up.

It's just maybe not those things. But if you hit off of the dartboard, it's still not on anything that you might love, whereas if you're aiming for, hey, I run a thriving, sustainable business. I'm traveling the world, having adventures. I'm doing LARPs. I'm butted it up, even if I miss or I'm I'm off the dartboard. I'm close to it. I'm still in the area of things that are lighting me up that, like, turn me on. And that's like a mama Gina reference too. It's like, not just erotic energy. It's just like the I'm alive, right? And I love that dartboard reference, because where are you going? Where are you pointing to? Okay. Just don't want to be sad. Okay. Do you want to be happy? Do you want to be delighted? Do you want to be furious? Do you want to be angry?

Because sometimes we want to feel the anger, sometimes we want to feel the sadness and the grief, and we're just like, okay, but does that make sense? Send me a message if it doesn't make sense. But I think acknowledging the Dart boards that you have set up for your life, whether it's I just don't want this anymore, and then you're just circling the drain, for lack of a better word, energetically, not doing anything different. And I know you're you've probably heard this before. If you don't do anything different, you can be surprised when nothing different happens. But also, happens. But also, I see it, and I've done it as we've all done it before, right, where we're like, Yeah, but I thought it'd be different by now, okay, but like, what have we been doing differently?

Well, you know, a little this and, okay, but like, actually, and that's not a shaming thing. It's an hey, let's, let's get evidence. Let's bring awareness into the thing, I think we're so often nervous about taking stock of what's here, because we don't want to admit what's what's here, because we're not doing some of the things we know we should be doing. But if we acknowledge what's here, then we have to acknowledge that we haven't done the things to get to where we want to go, because we're sad that we're not there yet, because we haven't done the things, because we haven't acknowledged because we're still there and we're still repeating the cycles. But it's fine. It's fine, it's fine.

It's fine, because we just don't want to be sad, and we know this makes us not sad, not happy, but not bad. Do you see how that can be an endless cycle, and then you get to 50 to 60 to 70, and you're like, Yeah, but I thought I'd do this by now. I'm like, oh, but like, you know, someday maybe we're like, it's too much to be happier people who are just, you know, polyamorous or whatever, you could go your whole life playing it cool because You're nervous about looking silly and reaching for joy, and I've seen it happen. I've been a military wife for 13 years now, and the military experience is not for everyone, but I've seen what happens when people give up and just play cool. I think you're worthy of trying. I really do with that. Let's take a sip of our water. Oh, getting serious, okay, all right, we got more.

The next one is. Tend to your body, because here's what happens when Joy feels out of reach or probably punishing ourselves in other ways. I don't know. I said this on a live I didn't say this on the podcast, at least, I don't think, but that's okay. We can all get reminders of things right? The way you think about yourself directly impacts the way you treat yourself. So you think you are essentially bad and terrible human and not worthy of anything? How do you think you're going to treat yourself? Mm, hmm, yeah. So if you believe that your soul is good and that maybe, even maybe, if you're like, ah, AJ, I don't know, maybe that you're here on a purpose, we could take care of ourselves a little bit when we have body capacity to think straight, everything's easier.

If you have eaten food today, and I have different feelings on food, it comes down to there is like craving soul food, right? Sometimes we need that chips in queso. Sometimes we need those brownies. And then there's body nourishing food, right, which can also look like chips and queso, but like fruit and like protein and things right, like water, and I know some people hate drinking water, but I'm telling you, your body needs hydration if you're just taking in sugar and caffeine and coffee, like, you're just dehydrating your body, and you're like, Yeah, but water, but, like, I don't know, grab some meal. Grab some like, not try harder, but I'm just and, like, water with a straw can make a huge difference. Like, research shows you actually drink three times as more with a straw.

And I'm not saying this in a judgy way. I'm saying this because we don't think our bodies play any impact onto our emotions, but they do. We're just, we're going to church today. Y'all so get your fancy heads. Um, we think our bodies are just, oh, here I am. Or some people are like, I'm a spirit living a human experience, or I'm just a flesh suit.

Like, none of that far end spectrum is helpful if you're sleepless, like, Okay, if you're a parent, you know what it's like when you've got three hours of sleep, if you've ever been sick and you've got three hours sleep or jet life, like, you know your brain's not functioning at full capacity. So when we're getting 345, hours of sleep a night, and we're like, Why is this hard to reach for joy, or, like to look or have these hard conversations, because your nervous system's deep fried tired, right? We're not eating, like, some food, and we're skipping meals and, like, starving ourselves or not drinking enough water, and we're just like, it's fine. We gotta go like, how do you think your body's gonna feel?

It's gonna feel exhausted. So step one, if you're like, AJ, all of this feels like a lot of work. Step one might be, girl, go take a nap. Go take a nap. Go get some sleep. Turn off your phone, take your Facebook app, off your phone. Like, I don't care what you do. You You know what you need, that thing that you're probably like, no, it's fine, but keeps nagging at you you're knowing, yeah, okay, we will definitely talk about that next week. We Yeah, but your nudge is probably telling you something that your body needs, that you may be ignoring lately, maybe not.

Maybe you're like, actually, AJ, I'm on top of it. I love this for you. Go, team go. And if some of this is feeling too stretchy, come back to the basics and be like, hey. Am I missing a rung here? Remember episode two? I think it was halto, hungry, angry, lonely, tired, overwhelmed, address, address, those things and, like, remember, we got systemic stuff, poison water. We're swimming in it, society, world, America, like it's doing the things. So this is on us to be like, okay, that aside right now, what do I need to tend to my body so that I can show up in this world, survive through it, first off, and then thrive.

Hold space, have capacity to hold your thread of the of the reality that you want. And I know people are in Europe, and I've got listeners all over, but like, it's all connected. We're all interconnected throughout the world, and there's stuff going on everywhere. So this applies across the board. Does that make sense? I know I asked that a lot, but it's because I want you to hear me that none of this is pedantic or small or it all counts.

It's these small, tiny things, but it's really a small but it all adds up. Okay, along those lines, be diligent. This is what is it? Say with me? Ah, practice. I'm sure you just rolled your eyes, and that's okay. You can laugh with me. Be diligent about this. This is a practice. Take notes if you're like, I'm a sciency person, like, I don't know this is a bit too woo for me. Hey, you're welcome here. I love it. My sister just got her nursing license and, like, badass, and I'm so stoked for her. And like that. Took practice. She was diligent in how she showed up. But if you're a science person, that you're like, cool, take notes.

Hey. Did I do joy today? Did I do gratitude today? Do I notice a difference in how I feel when I do it? Do some evidence, gathering. See what happens. Come back to me with your notes, because I'd love to hear what happens. But like, if you don't do it for a while, it's like, the when people are like, Oh yeah, I got my run shoes, and people are like, how do you like them? Ah, you know. And they're like, oh, so they're uncomfortable. Oh, no, you know. Oh, are they too tight? You know? Well, what's up with Well, I haven't worn them yet. Oh, okay. Well, you cannot give an opinion if you haven't tried it yet, right?

Like, try it, see what happens. So be diligent. Try it more than once. These things take habits, take time. Whether it's 20 days, 40 days, 268 days, doesn't really matter. But try it steadily. And what is it? Persistency over consistency. I love that. I love that because so often clients, friends, people, it's like, we do things for a couple days, and then we stop for a date, and then we're like, we are worms. I'm terrible. I dropped the ball and said, Whoa, hey, where's the staff? Self flagellation coming in.

No, no. Put put it down. Put it down like, okay, so we missed a day, and let's pick back up. Okay. What did we learn? Why can we get curious about why we stop Joy practices, why we stop taking care of ourselves, why we stop looking for joy? Why we stop speaking beauty, when we see it, when we stop speaking life and fangirling our friends, when we stop having gratitude for the small moments in our life that make us go, Yeah, this is the goodness. I was sitting with my dog Coco today, and I was reading, I looked over and she was asleep. She sleeps a lot. She's like, 14.

But I was like, Man, when I was a kid, I always wanted dogs and, like, a husband and to, like, read books and be in Ben. Just be like, Wow, this is great. Or, like, by a couch in the afternoon, like I could see in my mind's eye. And today I was sitting on my couch reading, and she was then I was like, this is just like I imagined it. Screenshot, gratitude, saying it out loud. See what I'm saying. Like, it all works together. Okay. Um, okay, two, two and a half ish, more. Stay with me. Okay, gain versus gap. This. This is also helpful when we're coming from that science lens of like, does it even matter? It does it's like, sometimes we're like, Yeah, but we're so far away. We're like, reaching, and we're like, but I'm not to happiness yet, or I'm not there. And some people think you've got to, like, do X, Y, Z, to be happy, to have whatever.

But really it's like, okay, how can we feel happy now? How can we feel joy now? How can we do these things now? These other things are unchangeable. Okay, let's be the person who's showing up in that and like, the cards will come as they come, right? Um, but we're so focused sometimes on the gap of where we are and where we want to be that we often don't look about back and see how far we've come. Wow. Like, just look, I bet five years ago, you would look at you now and be like, damn, whoa. Like, how neat that you doing. X, Y, Z.

Maybe there's some stuff that you're like, man, they'd be really disappointed. But the fact that you're still hearing you're still showing up, you're still trying, like, that counts for a lot. Past you might not realize everything you've been through, that you've been doing your best. Maybe they're like, hey, but we could try XYZ, and you're like, tried it, you know, oh, or maybe this, tried it, you know. But maybe that enthusiasm, we could use a little as well, right?

But can you look back and realize all the things you've accomplished, all the things you've grown in, we often do not give ourselves enough credit for where we are now before we're like, Okay, next, okay, next, without actually pausing, taking that in, being like, wow, I made it. We're here. Cool. What's about to unfold next? What do I want to cultivate? What does that look like in this place of grounded, contented joy, versus I gotta go. I gotta go because it's never gonna be an I remember the day that my launch day of my book, September 22 2021 my books came that day, launch day. It was a whole situation, and I held my book in my hand, and I was like, I don't feel any different.

And it astounded me, because I remember people saying, like, when you hit success, when you hit these different things, you're still you. And I was like, Yeah, but then I'll be a published author with a publisher in the whole nine yards. And I held my book in my hands. I was like, This is amazing. I like blood, sweat, tears. It's a Horcrux, for sure. I. But I was still me, and that shook me. And I remember pausing be like, I need to remember this for the rest of my life. Anytime I'm like, yeah, when I get to XYZ, I'll be happy, or I'll be No, because I thought when I made it there, I'd be like, everything's perfect from here on out. No, after that, my body actually crashed really hard. And then I got sober, or No, I was sober when that happened, but like I was it was dark, and it was a lot, and it was tense.

That'll be another episode, but I just say that to say this takes time, and when we look at how far we've come, we can have that gratitude as we move forward, without having that chasing, hustle, bro culture, energy, gotta go work all day, work all night, no sleep. Sleep when I'm dead. If you sleep when you're dead, you won't because you're dead. And second, no sleep, no means that your body won't be able to function at the actual rate it needs to to function well and to be able to process joy and those emotions, right? Because if we're all just like, it's fine, it's fine, it's fine. It's fine.

Eventually we're gonna explode. And as Brene Brown calls it, we chandelier all over the place. And it's just like a chandelier. And it's like, you know, if a chandelier falls and then glass goes everywhere, and it's like the star that broke the camel's back, except it's like, how dare you bought it out? And you like, lose your stuff and your marbles. People like, whoa. Wait. Like, what happened? Not a big deal. It was one thing on top of a lot of things. Does that make sense? Yeah, okay, last two, these are fun and my favorite things.

And I think, I think a lot of people probably think these are my two things, but you can see from the list that this is joy is something I consciously cultivate. Yes, I run high. Thank you. ADHD, combined type and also, like, I don't know. I think God just sneezed me when making me and I just got a double portion of joy. And there was a year in there, my first year of sobriety, that was absolute hell, absolute hell. And there was three months in there that I remember, I did not smile, I didn't know if I still had a soul. We're going to talk about this in a whole different podcast episode, but I want to touch on this because I think it's important, and everybody has different mental health journeys.

I'm not trying to say everything that worked for me will work for you. I'm saying there's at least one thing on this whole list that probably will help. But I didn't laugh, I didn't smile for three months, like I was actually really freaked out about it. And I remember the first time I smiled, and I was like, Oh, I'm still here. Okay, if I can smile, maybe I can laugh. It was, I think, like, two weeks later that I laughed at something. I was like, okay, okay, folks, we got possibilities again. Okay, gosh, this taking longer than I wanted.

Do you know what I mean? Like, it was, it was just wild. But that also goes with the gain and gap of settings, like, Yeah, but I'm not, I'm not fully happy yet, or not out of this depression, or not out of XYZ, okay, but is the cloud a little bit lighter, okay, but is there a little less heaviness, like those micro movements and those small changes of I went outside today and you hadn't been outside for a week, even if you were outside for two minutes, oh my gosh. What a celebration. That's a maraca moment, right?

Or if you're doing a big business move and you're about to pitch yourself to this big conference, and you haven't done that before, and you did it with confidence, like, that's a maraca moment, right? We downplay some stuff when we're in the middle of it. But if you actually look at what big deal that actually is in context, that's huge, it's it's huge, and it's worthy of celebration. So gang versus gap, okay, circling back, because I think a lot of people just brush it all off, but it's all conscious, okay, dress for joy, right? Now, if you're watching my YouTube video, I look very much like an average human. I've got my hairs in like, curlers. So I have a, what do you call this? A stocking cap? I have a stocking cap and just a regular sweatshirt, which my friend is about to, like vinyl. It up for me to be sparkly and fabulous. I'm very excited about that. But right now it's a plain sweatshirt. So I look, I look like a normal person most of the time. I look like a watch out of a storybook. I've got layers.

Hilary Rushford made a style course called style and style Billy and she has you make like a five word style vibe, which I love. If we ever talked about clothes, you've heard me talk about this. So mine is like everyday, colorful Ren, fair Bard, which I like my high boots. I like things that twirl well. I like my layers. It needs to be comfy. I need to be able to do, like, squats and activities and stuff because I read the kids, or I'm like, running errands or painting some my clothing is somewhat eclectic. So dressing for joy.

For me, looks like I just walked out an adventure storybook ready to take on the world. For you, it might look different. You might have like, sporty goth vibes, or maybe you're like, Oh, I like feeling classy and chic. I love this. For you, what is dressing for joy look like? And if you're like, AJ, clothes don't aren't that important. Maybe clothes haven't felt accessible for you to explore in this way. I'm a thrift shop girl, so most of my clothes come. From the thrift shop or from my adventures around the world, but what if we open the possibility that maybe you haven't had a chance to explore what dressing for joy could look like for you? And that will be another podcast, but I just want to put that pin in it, because sometimes we were like, it doesn't really matter, and that tells me that there's something there that happened, that maybe somebody made fun of them for clothes, or maybe they haven't found clothes that fit them because different body shapes sizes.

That's a whole thing, right? Like bikini industrial complex. But when they say it doesn't matter, it's probably because it wasn't allowed to matter, or that it mattered too much and it hurts too much to think about. So that's a different conversation. But then maybe ask, What's one thing in the way that I'm showing up that would bring me more joy? Maybe it's a red lipstick, maybe it's silly socks, maybe it's a coat or a pin, a sticker on your water bottle, but the way you outwardly show up, and it can be different for different people, and safety comes into factors too.

If you're trans or or a woman of color, like, there's different things to take into account here, right, of like hair and all that stuff. So I understand that I've got some privilege as a white woman here dressing in the way that I do sometimes, and I try to use that responsibly. And what does this look like for you? Right? Because we've got to work, excuses, reasons for not. I understand. So if we lower the bar, because if you're like, I would wear, wear jingle skirts all the time. I love this for you, cool. But if you're like, but I won't, yeah, no, totally valid. I don't either like, what's the bar look like? Maybe it's a bold skirt color. Like, does that make sense? It doesn't. None of this, all or nothing, no or nothing. It's all spectrums, okay?

Last thing, dance breaks. I talk about this all the time. Dance breaks are so great. Just move your body for three minutes. Sometimes people don't want to go for runs or do the different things, although also working out brings me joy, because it gets the adrenaline out. But dance breaks just three minutes, even if it's just swaying to a good song or like in a car, like having good music flow through, if you think it doesn't matter, think about the music that they played during horror movies or action movies or romantic movies. Music has the power to shift our emotions, like the science behind I love science, so like, if you're like, This sounds like a lot of actually, it's all pretty ground in science as well.

Music can shift your mood. So quick, ask any of my clients that have hopped on calls with me that we'll have this moment to process. Mama Gina has a swamping where it's a rage. Song, grie song, turn on. Song, dance breaks three minutes. If you're like, I hate everything cool, go have a dance break and see what shifts. Even if you're just like, oh, and you're just like, raging, you might feel better at the end of it, because you've actually processed and let some of that rage and anger out, and then you're like, Oh, I feel lighter. I feel better. Now, even if you're not totally happy, remember, gap versus gain, you feel better than you did. And that's the point.

It's all these micro shifts that all add up. It's not just like, sorry, you can't see me, or some of you can, but it's like, the like, turn off the light and then turn on, you know, or like, a peek a boo, like with kids, where it's like, you can't it's like, I'm sad now I'm happy. Sometimes, sometimes the shift can be that quick, and sometimes it takes a bunch of finessing and tweaking, like a sound board, you know inside out, it's kind of like that. Sometimes, sometimes it takes more effort than other days, and some days it's just like, we are cozy panda days, right? We got our cozy potato club days, we got our sparkly potato club days, we got our feisty potato club days. We got our Don't touch me because I'm I've got my four cup holders at the ready. Days. It just is what it is.

And then you decide, do I want to stay here? Do I want to shift it? Do I have capacity to shift it? What tools do I want to use to shift it? What does that look like? We start asking the questions, because if you know where you are and where you want to go, you can work backwards or forwards and see what your next steps are, and then do those, or say, half of those don't feel accessible. So we're just going to be here. And then what do you need to be tender and gentle with yourself that day? Does that make sense? Because some days you're just like, not feeling it. On day three of my period, I'm just like, I can't so I'm in cozy clothes, and I try to just do minimum as possible. That's okay. Not every day is a high energy day. Joy is not about high energy.

Joy is about I a joy is about sinking into the alignment of what's here and feeling the possibilities of it, feeling the radiance of a moment. Joy is embodying the. The laughter and the giggles and the memory of something in your bones joy is the wave of oxytocin and adrenaline that goes through your body as you realize how lucky am I to be living in this moment in this lifetime to witness this joy is the way you light up when you see somebody you love. Joy is the moment when you dance and you turn and you see somebody else laughing at the same time, or you see something in this store, and you make eye contact with this stranger, and you both have the same look on your faces. And then you both smile, because you're like, Yeah, that was weird, I don't know, and you both go into another aisle.

Joy is the connection of the present with your soul, recognizing and honoring that this is the goodness. And so I invite you to explore this this week, of what joy is, who you are, how it can weave into your days with lightness and not pressure of I have to be happy now. Welcome to flight. 200 No, no, this is in our customer service voice. How can I help you today? No, no. Joy is man. The world is big, and yet there is goodness worth seeing, finding and reveling in joy is good dinners, laughter and falling asleep in your bed being like, I'm glad I was here for that.

Some of the craziness, not so much, but that, that, goodness, yeah, yeah, that moment when time stands still and almost feels like a sacred moment where you're like, Whoa. That felt like something out of a movie, the edge of an ocean, a big mountain kayaking, or the washing water, or a hot shower where the water is just pouring over you and you're like, I could stay in here forever. Joy is that moment when you're like, I'm here and I'm okay.

So comment below. Let me know your thoughts. If you liked this episode, share it with a friend, or listen again and know that you are worthy of goodness and joy and delight, and then I'm proud of you this week, if Joy feels out of reach, check in with your body. See what they need. Drink some water, eat your cake, eat your carrots, and as always, sing your soul song. Talk to you next week, friends.