When we grow up in situations of stress or lack, joy can be the last thing on anyone’s mind.
Co-dependence can often mean that we tie our happiness to other people. We can feel responsible for their circumstances, inner stress or unhappiness.
As children, we develop a variety of difficult emotions about our caretakers and their circumstances.
Parents who are stressed and overly focused on their emotional needs can take it out on the children. A parent may have taught you that your joy and happiness are in direct conflict with theirs. Or that your joy is somehow inappropriate.
They might have wanted you to join them in their pain or punish you for being untouched by situations that were beyond your control.
Alternatively, their circumstances might have been so challenging that even though they encouraged you to enjoy yourself, it was difficult for you to do so. A parent might have been sick or lonely or struggling to make ends meet.
As children, we have high levels of empathy and can feel guilty that we are enjoying ourselves while someone dear is not doing so.
As adults, we learn that it is appropriate to try to participate in other people’s misery if we can. And while compassion and help are wonderful offerings to others in need, we’re not required to make misery our constant companion.
We can care about someone’s suffering, support them and do what we can to help, without believing that our own happiness is somehow a betrayal of them.
We each have a right to experience joy. Joy is an inner experience. None of us are truly condemned to suffering no matter what our external circumstances. However, our external circumstances can make it challenging for us to source this inner joy.
We have much to learn from people who experience difficult circumstances and yet find a way to smile and experience inner sweetness and joy. I have encountered such people in all kinds of circumstances, and they have humbled me each time.
Joy is an internal experience. It can live alongside compassion and other emotions. It is something that runs through the fabric of life, through each one of us. And it is your right in this lifetime to experience it, without tying it to someone else’s destiny.
A Practice to Help You Reconnect With Joy
The following reflections can help you become more aware of your relationship with joy, how it may have been shaped by your experiences, and how you might invite more of it into your life.
Take your time with these steps. You can write your reflections in a journal and return to the practice whenever you wish.
Step 1: Reflect on Joy in Your Life
Reflect on how much you are experiencing joy in your life.
Is this something you experienced today? This week? This month or year?
When was the last time that you experienced joy? Why?
Write this down.
Step 2: Explore Your Beliefs About Joy
Reflect and write about the following:
- What are your beliefs about joy?
- How do you relate joy to external circumstances?
- How do you relate it to other people? Is it necessary for your joy that others also feel joy?
- Is there someone or something in your life right now that ties up your joy? Why?
Step 3: Explore Your Childhood Experiences of Joy
Reflect and write about the following:
- As a child, what was the role of joy in your family?
- Was joy prioritised by anyone in some way? (For example, my mother used to set everything aside sometimes, no matter how difficult everything was, so we could just have fun.)
- Was joy considered something frivolous and irrelevant?
- As a child, did someone criticise or blame you for feeling joy?
- As a child, was there something that made you feel guilty for feeling joy?
Step 4: Connect With the Feeling of Joy
Close your eyes and try to connect with joy. Consider a time when you felt joy if you don’t feel it now.
Breathe and allow yourself to feel this. Try to relax into it.
Emotions and images may arise. Allow yourself to feel these emotions.
If you feel a need to cry, do so.
If you feel a need to hug yourself, do so.
If you want to smile or laugh, do so.
Step 5: Invite More Joy Into Your Life
Set an intention to bring more joy into your life if it isn't something you're experiencing much of right now.
The following affirmation might help you. You can also do a ritual.
I am a divine being
I am as worthy of love, joy and freedom as any other human being
I am worthy of pursuing my own path
I am free to do so
I am inviting joy within myself
I am inviting the Universe to help me on this journey
To help me source more peace, more joy and independence.