ahhhh Joy

“You should watch Inside Out 2” one of my therapy clients said to me. “Tell me about it” I said. “Well it starts off with the main character being a ‘good person’. That’s nice I thought. But I get so passionate that people’s behaviors are separate from their identity that I immediately wonder what else is going on in this movie. It creates too much cognitive dissonance when we label ourselves ‘good’ or ‘bad’. When we say “he’s a narcissist” or “she’s arrogant”, we label a person’s entire identity based on maybe just a few choices. I won’t even give kids heavy diagnoses because I believe in the power of self fulfilling prophecy and think all kids are malleable and have hope of change. I won’t even tell a dog “you’re a bad dog”, that’s how strongly I feel about it. I know, a little extreme.

 “There’s a lot of other feelings added, and anxiety takes over.” Well I can understand how that feels. “Ok, how does it end?” I wonder. “It ends with Joy” she said. Ahhhh yes. Joy. The human emotion that changes our entire circumstances, or rather just our ability to handle our circumstances. I wouldn’t even call it an emotion. I would call it supernatural. Somehow, the essence of Joy lightens our load. Somehow, laughter heals. It grounds us back to what’s important in life. Family. Community. God. Faith. Helping others. Living for a heavenly reality. Joy brings us strength. It unwinds us. It brings us back to childlikeness, where play is paramount and our imaginations can go in the clouds. But some days, we need to just stay in the clouds of Joy.