Joy in Life...

How can we find Joy in Life?

'Time spent laughing is time spent with the gods.

Japanese Proverb

Definition of Joy:

'the emotion of great delight or happiness caused by something exceptionally good or satisfying; keen pleasure; elation.

Joy! Enjoying and being in Joy. Being NOW!

Most of us remember real joy, when we were children.

On the playground - Swinging-Flying with the world speeding by. Exuberance and exaltation!

Joy!

Why is it, that it was once so easy... and seems so difficult today?

What has changed?

To me, it is living this moment, the NOW, being present with all I am, in this present moment. This is where I experience JOY.

The Magic of Joy...

Joy disappears, when I am not fully present in the moment. And the only thing which takes me out of this beautiful experience of being present here and now, are my own thoughts!

The moment we step out... start thinking... and projecting these thoughts on the situation we're in and people that surround us.

We may believe that from a past experience, we will surely not enjoy the moment we are in right now...

and then, we may want to be in a different place, than the one we are just now living.

Our thoughts are non-stop. We judge and hold back... we look to improve the present moment to make it the way we think it should be.

There is NO joy in this.

Then, when we finally have a moment of joy... we become aware of this wonderful feeling and we want to hold on to it with all our strength... and by doing so, we set ourselves up for suffering and pain.

Everything changes all the time... this is how it is. We never know what's around the corner.

"I want to hold on to this feeling" – and it escapes! Gone forever.

Once, we knew "to be". Just there, having a good time. This was true for all feelings... not just joy... we could get really excited, really mad and really silly.

What happened to the Joy in Life?

We got BIG... and serious... and important! We built ourselves an identity, an image. We started comparing ourselves to others... and experiences became references for pleasure or pain.

We try to repeat the experiences we remember as enjoyable, and expected to reproduce this exact feeling. This is quite the recipe for unhappiness.

We may even get to the conclusion that we don't deserve better. That unhappiness is somehow what we deserve.

I'm not good enough, and nobody likes me.

Our beliefs and thoughts are what we project, into any given situation. We fear, we look for approval, we hold back for fear of being "weird". And most of all, when something isn't going the way we think it should, we blame others. We are RIGHT. Because who would we be, if we let go of that?

We are holding on to this image for dear life!

We want to feel in CONTROL.

And... there is nothing here we can control.

Yes, we try very hard...

Return to Joy and Happiness

* Understanding that the only place anything ever really happens, is NOW. The past is only in our thoughts and memories, it is not real anymore.

* Understanding that the future is a fabrication and is also only in our heads... it isn't real. We may make plans (and there is no problem with making them), and something completely different may actually happen.

* We live only NOW. So we might as well enjoy it, no matter what actually happens.

* Awareness of this moment. Being here, completely.

* Beliefs. Many of our thoughts and beliefs have become engraved into us, and we live by these beliefs just like robots - they have become automatic. We should sit down and question our beliefs and thoughts.

We may find that these thoughts are really not true. And once we can see this, they just loose their power over us.

For me, the best concept/belief/thought inquiring method I know is The Work of Byron Katie.

On her website there is all you will need to start the process. It's free.

The Work: www.thework.com