An excerpt from Jo Emerson, a British blogger, on January:
“In the UK we talk a lot about having the ‘January blues’ because the cold weather and post-Christmas comedown are foremost in people’s minds.
So, to my mind that means January is the best time to talk about joy! Because true joy has less to do with what’s happening on the outside and far more to do with what’s happening on the inside.
The inside of you. Inside your mind. Inside your soul. Inside your guts. Inside your heart.
When my mind plays tricks on me and tells me that I will only experience joy when a certain set of circumstances are realized I struggle to feel joyous because I am focused on something that isn’t currently in my reality. Also, when I finally ‘have’ those circumstances my joy will be fleeting because I will immediately start fearing that I might lose them.
Do you see how placing your criteria for joy on a set of externals only causes joy to be fleeting or permanently missing in your life?
Now, when I listen to the wisdom of my guts, which tell me that joy is something I can choose to experience moment by moment despite my external circumstances then I get to keep the joy I find. Because this kind of joy is an inner connectedness, a trusting in Life and an acceptance of reality. This kind of joy is a permanently accessible state I can return to by choice.
Even in the deepest traumas and darkest places people have managed to access this joy… Viktor Frankl wrote about this so movingly in Man’s Search for Meaning where he describes the harshness of life in a prisoner of war camp. He says:
“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
This is true freedom and once you are free you can access joy whenever you wish.”
