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Cultivating Joy:  I AM, I CREATE

Much as the gardeners I see on my daily walks cultivate their gardens and beds, we are responsible for cultivating our own emotional and spiritual gardens.  The emotions as well as the thoughts and actions that generate those emotions are powerful contributors to the crop of feelings that we harvest.  I think of the phrase I am, I Create when I think of the predominant thoughts that I harbor on a daily basis.


“I am a joyful person…I am a happy person.  I’m creating joy in the lives of myself and my community with my words and actions.”

 

Scientists have figured out that most of the thoughts we humans return to habitually are negative in character. This excellent YouTube video discusses this tendency, which has the technical term of Cognitive Distortion.  Defined, cognitive distortions are irrational behavior patterns and thoughts that can cause you to perceive reality inaccurately.  These negative thinking patterns can reinforce issues such as anxiety and depression. In plain terms and brought to relevance to current events, the distressing and disturbing things we are observing can reinforce preexisting unhelpful ways of perceiving reality that further reinforce our underlying anxiety or depression.  This can cause us to spiral from anxiety and depression to despair and paralysis, exactly the worst place to be with an authoritarian regime such as the one we are currently experiencing in America in 2025.  Sound logical?  With so many sweeping changes occurring to the fabric of our country, and the services and institutions that we depend on, it is only natural that even the most steadfast individual will experience anxiety and even despair watching the erosion of society and democracy itself.  While I have discussed the duality our thoughts can distill down to (love or fear), what I haven’t gotten into are things that can serve as an antidote to the corrosive nature of persistent negative thoughts.  Cultivating joy, much as gardeners are preparing and cultivating their beds, is a viable and worthy option to combat despair, pessimism and habitual negative thoughts. 

 

**Please note that what I am suggesting and discussing is not a substitute for getting appropriate mental health advice and therapy, or consultation with mental health physicians and therapists.  I am mentioning this approach as a framework of strategies to deal with our current new abnormal in a way that looks at the factors we can control. Seek appropriate mental health advice and treatment from professionals able to provide that type of professional support.  What I am relating is icing, not the whole dessert.

 



Last week I had coffee with a dear friend who had started a new role with a new company and was filled with the optimism of new networking circles and work goals.   We chatted about her excitement about the possibilities of the role, as well as the joys of watching her young school age children grow and develop their own individual personalities (the kiddos are twins).  As is inevitable, our talk turned from my plans to do another Brazil cultural dance immersion trip this summer to reflection on a similar journey we took two years ago as roommates.  Our conversation led us to current events, and coping with same.  I mentioned that all we can do is try to cultivate joy in our everyday lives.  My friend looked at me and her jaw dropped; I think her exact words were “OMG you are right!”  Easier said than done may be your next thought. But cultivating joy is something that can be as automatic as taking a breath.  Cultivation implies that there is a certain amount of autonomy in making the decision to see and seek joy.  One must look for things to be happy and joyful for.  My go-to source for this is nature. 

 

It's cherry blossom and daffodil season here in the Pacific Northwest.  While we continue to get our fair share of rainy gray days and wind, we are also blessed with trees bursting with cherry blossom blooms and daffodils and early bulbs blooming with abandon, providing bright splashes of color everywhere.  It has been stormy this week so there is pink and white blossom snow on the suddenly green, lush grass.  Give me blossom snow over cold snow anytime!  The birds seem to sing a little louder, and the frogs are having symphonies of sound wherever there are bodies of water to be found.  When there are signs of spring, and I find my thoughts turning to anticipation of the full glory PNW spring and summer to come, with all associated activities.  Baseball opening day has happened, and the M’s won; with Ichiro throwing out the first pitch.  The start of the baseball season is a ritual being repeated all over the country, for teams in the major leagues and farm teams.  With the political chaos, thoughts of days spent watching baseball games, with peanuts, and beer and enjoying the outdoors are things to anticipate and find joy in.


 

For many schools, it’s also time for spring break, and spring vacations for kids in both college and grade school.  It’s also time that many people begin to think of summer vacations.  I’m not at all ignoring or diminishing the stress and trauma of individuals and families impacted by the mass firings or the angst being suffered by those of our neighbors and relatives who have lost employment and are contemplating the effect of that on maintaining housing and food to live.   The potential for loss of needed services which have been staples of our society is also traumatic, as is the attempt by individuals at the head of the regime to erase, marginalize or discount the very existence of huge demographic groups in this country, while they also insinuate that those who need those services are somehow weak, defective or abnormal.  It’s malignant gaslighting at its most despicable.   I am suggesting that even in the midst of the pain and despair of watching these things happen and feeling powerless, it is possible to find things to be thankful for; ways to counter the negative emotions these cruel circumstances engender and regain a sense of personal power.  One way to accomplish this is to engage in the process and practice of cultivating joy. 

 

Cultivating joy is doing that thing that humans do in times of trauma and uncertainty. We have faith in a positive outcome and better days to come, nourishing an indomitable spirit and belief that even in the midst of chaos, disaster and unspeakable change, positive things and life go on, the sun continues to rise, and the possibility for positive change still exists.  There is sun after storm, and warm spring breezes after the winds and blizzards of winter.  Times like these are times to lean on family and community supports, because sometimes when you are downcast, you have a friend or ally who is cheerful, and able to bring some sunshine into your life. (I watch amazingly talented singers shine on shows like America’s Got Talent) As Maya Angelou says, “Sometimes you can be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud.” It’s also a time for resistance, in whatever form that may take for you.  A very well-kept secret is that the very act of cultivating joy in the face of authoritarian movements is resistance in itself. I got that gem from historian Heather Cox Richardson.  Please stop and think about that. 

 

People at the head of governments, organizations and in some aspect of law enforcement may have the capability to impose unspeakable acts of oppression, repression, kidnapping, imprisonment, attempted degradation, erasure and regulation on vast segments of the population, but the one thing they absolutely cannot do is steal your joy.  YOUR JOY IS A RADICAL ACT OF RESISTANCE AND REBELLION.  A movie with the strong theme of hope in the midst of despair is The Shawshank Redemption.  There are other inspirational movies, and books, with a common theme of individuals who choose to find and live their joy, even while living in times of negativity and challenge.  Read those books!  Watch those Movies!  Look for the joy and promise. Stories have much to tell us that can be translated to real life to enrich and empower us.

 

I encourage you to cultivate your joy as a radical act of both resistance and rebellion.  There is a mock Latin aphorism that comes to mind: 

Illegitimum non carborundum;  Don’t Let The Bastards Grind You Down.

 Radical Resistance, Rebellion and Joy is where it’s at for me. 

 

 


Soundtrack

My favorite versions of the song Blackbird are the soundtrack as I write these words…from the original by Paul McCartney, which was written for Black Women during the Civil Rights

movement, to a lovely version by Sarah McLachlan, to the latest, triumphal version by Beyonce, and a chorus of African American Country Music artists on Cowboy Carter.

 

Blackbird, arise and fly…AND KEEP THE FAITH (emphasis mine)

 

 

 
 
 

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