What is Joy?
- a feeling? A state of being? A response? Today I invite you to consider times in your life when you have experienced Joy...
“When you do things from your soul,
you feel a river moving in you, a joy.”
(Rumi)
Making supper for my family yesterday I fell into a moment of pure Joy. Nothing exceptional was happening - our "Chocolate Lands" CD was playing, I was sipping a very nice Apothic Dark wine, the curry dish I was preparing smelled heavenly... and I was filled with the unmistakable aroma of Joy. In that moment everything was perfect; I could have reclined in its stillness forever.
Joy, I think, is not about what we own, achieve, or hunger for. It cannot be bought or sold; it cannot be predicted, commercialized, or replicated. It is a chaotic, unpredictable, light that flares into our awareness according to its own dictates. Like air, I suspect that joy surrounds us at all times, but that we are only aware of it when we still ourselves and open our heart to the moment.
For just a few heartbeats yesterday afternoon I awoke to the goodness of life, the wonder and beauty of simple things - food, wine, family, home - and in those heartbeats I felt the movement of Joy in the current of life.
“One can never consent to creep
when one feels an impulse to soar.”
(Helen Keller, The Story of My Life)
Joy is the soaring of the soul, an absolute union with the Divine. It is a bridge that Love creates to transport us into the heart of something vastly greater than ourselves. To be "in Love" is to know Joy; to be in Christ is to know Joy; to just "be" is to know Joy. So very much healing happens when we lower ourselves into the warm and embracing waters of Joy's deep pool.
Be open to the power of Joy in this moment. Open your awareness to the good things in your life, to the wonderful ordinariness of whatever is happening right now. Breathe deeply, be grateful... just let go and fall into the water of Love. Joy might just spring upon you.
The color of Joy...
Some say that it is our natural state of being
To ponder further:
From the Bible - "The kingdom of God is not food and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit." (Romans 14.17)
From Buddhism - "You should devote yourselves to find joy in pleasures of the Dharma, and should take no pleasure in desires." (Holy Teaching Vimalakirti 4)
From Hinduism - "The Infinite is the source of joy. There is no joy in the finite. Only in the Infinite is there joy. Ask to know the Infinite." (Chandogya Upanishad 7.23)
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