What Brings You Joy???

According to webster, joy is the feeling of great pleasure or happiness that come from success, good fortune or a sense of wellbeing. This definition feels a bit “dry” to me so I created my own. To me, joy means to FEEL love and to ALLOW love and joy to flow through.

What I mean by this is: Have you ever felt so in love that nothing else in life mattered? The neighbors didn’t matter, the news didn’t matter, your boss didn’t matter… You were in love, there was joy and you felt it, you let it all in… Or maybe that one time when you were on vacation and you watched the sunset, there was nothing else to do but to look at the sun, the nature and the beauty, at that moment time just stopped, you felt peace and you experienced joy… I believe that love and joy are interconnected, and when you feel one you instantly feel the other one too. To me, love and joy are two peas on a pod…

I was asked this question the other day, what brings me joy? And to answer that question I had to go for the feeling first. I asked myself: what am I in love with? What makes my heart feel warm? What makes me feel like time just stops? Some of the things that came up:

• Watching the sunset
• The perfection of nature
• Reading a book with a cup of tea
• Remembering I am loved
• Playing with my cats
• Simplicity
• Inspiring others
• Watching the moon and the stars at night
• Travelling

Even though these things inspire me in different ways, they bring forth the same feelings: joy and love. And every time throughout my day that I am exposed to any of these things, or even if I take a moment to think about what brings me joy, I feel like my heart just expands, and I experience calm, easiness, love and pure bliss.

When we are in a state of joy, we experience are all kinds of physiological responses in the body: first, we shift our internal state. It is IMPOSSIBLE to experience joy and to feel stressed, angry or anxious at the same time. Next, our nervous system is forced to calm down and we start to naturally regulate our bodies.

Our heart also expands, and that brings coherence to other parts of the body which in turn helps with emotional and hormonal regulation. According to psychology today, the heart’s energy is said to reach about three feet outside the physical body and can be detected by someone else seating nearby via an ECG (electrocardiogram), amazing, right??? Just think about this for a moment: When was the last time you were next to someone that made you feel so good just by being in their presence? How incredible is it to feel joy through someone else’s heart???

Most importantly, it FEELS good! And it feels good to feel good. The other day I heard this question and it stuck with me: What does reality matter without the FEELING???

What was meant by this question is that underneath anything we desire to experience in life, there’s a feeling that comes with it. And so by default all the things that we desire (the partner, the car, the house, the job, the vacation, etc… to name a few) is because of the FEELING that comes with it.

When we are in a state of joy, our mind is also receptive to things we can’t see and sometimes can’t make sense of, yet we can feel it. In other words what we feel is our own energy, and the energy of everything there is. How can watching a beautiful sunset feel so good ? It reminds me once again that the greatest things in life can’t be seen or heard, they are always felt…

But this process is different from person to person. And gaining awareness to what’s around you and the tiny things that bring you joy is step one. Opening your heart and allowing yourself to receive joy is step two. To gain this awareness, I recommend seating in silence, even if for a few moments each day. Allow for time to stop, allow for the appreciation of each moment to come in… breathe into your heart… And then ask yourself these questions:

• What makes you smile?
• What makes your heart feel warm?
• What inspires you?
• What makes you feel alive?
• When you were a child, what was one thing you did that was so fun time just stopped?
• What makes you feel like you are in love?

Now, let me ask you this question once again: what brings you joy??? I can say this with certainty that all the greatest things in life come when we are in a state of joy and love.

I wish for you to find joy in the smallest moments of your life. And once you are there, may this joy be your guiding light, that will inspire you to accomplishing your biggest dreams.

*Wishing you love and joy, Ariana *