Alrighty, we have sorted, dug out, wrote down and organized now it is time to make some choices. All of you have so far been subjected to my speech to choose joy and now we are going to discuss why we should make this choice first above all others because it is FREE.
Let’s start first with all the web sites and books that preach about living the life you want so you will have joy. Is that how you get joy. Absolutely not! What about all the stuff you can buy that will bring you joy? Emphatically NOT! Oh, I got it, what about having people make you happy. That brings us joy, doesn’t it? Now that is a good one but NO!
The word on the street is that you can find joy in a bottle so we have to buy it or smoke it or get someone to give it to us. It is not! Mind you it is not easy to get if we are used to living a joyless life but it is possible and available to us all. Do we hear that – it is available to all, rich, poor, married, single, parent, childless, employed or unemployed. AVAILABLE TO ALL! Whew, that is good to know, very good to know.
Now that we know it is within our reach let’s talk about the effects of having joy in our lives so that we understand why we should choose to be joyful. The first fallout to being joyful is the patience we will have with people. If we are being joyful every day we will gain such an appreciation for the timing and effect we have on people that we will gain patience while dealing with people. Don’t believe me – try being joyful for one day without loosing your temper. I’ll wait. Okay, see what I mean. When you choose joy you are also choosing not to loose your temper either or to get angry or to snap at people or to criticize people. You gain patience. Patience is good.
As a result of this joyful patience we will gain knowledge. We will see things that we have never seen before because we were too angry to see them. We will find out what makes people tick because we stuck around long enough to find out instead of running off in a huff. Are we seeing the correlation with this? Well, it doesn’t end here either.
We all know that I spend a lot of time helping women – I dream about how I can help. I have direction in my life but I didn’t get that direction until I began choosing joy. I started teaching workshops and putting a lot of money into the development of this goal and low and behold I lost my job. Boy, I was not impressed and I was depressed but I decided I would choose joy anyway because what was I really going to be able to do about it. So, I looked for employment and in the mean time I did some more development on the workshop and still taught it. I looked for sponsors to pay for the lunches but that didn’t work out either so I used my own money still. Still choosing joy as my bank account sunk deeper and deeper into that black hole called overdraft. I am caught up now and I still choose joy. I make a conscious effort to choose joy even though I am not feeling joyful. Why?
Because it gives me HOPE. If I choose joy I will gain patience therefore increasing my knowledge which gives me hope for my future, hope for women, hope for my family, hope for my life, hope for you and hope for grace. I know that whatever is going to happen to me in the future or even right now I will get through with flying colours because I have chosen to think joyfully. You see, choosing joy is so much more far reaching then you can ever imagine – ever in your lifetime. The ripple effect of choosing joy every day will go on for minutes, hours, days, years and decades. I like knowing that because I chose joy I effected someone’s mood for even one minute, gave someone something that they will never forget or taught my children that life can throw you lemons so let’s make some lemonade and find a good shade tree to drink it under. I want every one to have hope because hope is what life is made of. Hope is motivation to accept where your life is and make the changes necessary to get where you want to be. Hope is all about the future.
Having hope brings you joy. The circle of life!
August’s challenge is to choose joy to get hope so you can have real joy. How we are going to do that is wake up every morning and ask whom can I do something for today that needs me?
So, for the first week we are going to serve someone and see real joy. Look at it, study it, dream about it, touch it and crave it.
The second week we are going to smile more. Choose to put a smile on your pretty face even when we want to poke someone’s eye out.
The third week we are going to saviour what we saw the first week and second week while making a conscious effort to choose joy. Give yourself a break though because it is not easy to choose joy when it is much easier to rip someone’s head off.
The last week we want to make sure that we feel the joy. Make sure you make note of the feelings you are having. Have you changed a rotten mood into a good one? Have you staved off one of the daily fights with a loved one? Have you drawn people to you that haven’t spoken to you before? Have you seen how much differently you feel?
Get on the joy wagon and feel the hope bubbling up.
Choosing joy right along with ya,
Kathleen
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