Cultivating Joy . . . a recipe for creation

If you caught last week’s blog, you know releasing pain is the first step to happy. The next part requires curiosity and playfulness. It is called creation.

It is about creating a world I wish to be in. Feeling joy in my heart and taking actions to support it in reality. A dance between the heart and the mind, needing both for a good life.

It started innocently enough, when I was a School Counselor. I noticed on Sundays, my sense of dread building. Sometimes it would morph over to anxiety. This is a recipe for ruining my evening and creating a bad workday.

I decided to do it differently; merely curious, not holding an expectation. I changed my language, greeting my colleagues and students with “Happy Monday!” wearing a pretty dress. Taking it up a notch, turning into regularly bringing my mother’s coveted carrot cake. A recipe for a Happy Monday!

I learned the outcome of my Monday experiment. . . that shit worked!

It didn’t happen overnight, rather a slow evolution. It got big last year where I was blissed out despite career ruin. It didn’t matter on that day; I couldn’t get a job. I didn’t make a mad scramble for the Uber application or a waitressing job. I threw a party, where we ate fruit and cheese, drank wine, and cooked a royal meal. We played games and danced in the sun, laughing like hyena’s. It was a celebration unfolding on Happy Monday.

I never know what my Monday’s will look like these days. Life as a writer is strangely free from commitments, keeping me free from a ticking clock. But I can tell you, my great moments, where I am tasting a bite of success, typically happen on, you guessed it, Happy Monday’s.

I discovered that joy is the building block to dreams. Stacked, brick by brick, to where the practice of cultivating it in your human sensory body is preparing for its arrival. Programming it for that moment, where the story you wanted to have is now yours, your wishes becoming reality. And since it is Wednesday, I wish you all a Happy Hump Day!