Finding Joy in Your Everyday Life

Finding joy in your everyday life is probarbly something you haven’t given much thought of, especially since your thoughts are focus on things that matter most, like finding a job, attracting more clients, buying a home, getting over an addiction, or dealing with a defiant child.  Your morning routine isn’t glamorous or excited, rather it is monotonous and mundane.  You may even wake up with a to-do list, which details all the things you want or hope to accomplish for the day.  You start your day by immediately shifting into the doing mode and you go through it with tunnel vision.  So another day passes and you’re back where you were, or worst, you’re further behind on your to-do list.  Now you are feeling even more dissatisfied with yourself or your life.  With the exception of doing something fun every once in a while, your life is void of this wonderful emotion.

Believe it or not, joy is critical to your well-being as the food you eat, your shelter and the relationships you foster.   Joy is one of the fundamental principles of life, a positive emotion that makes us feel good about living and with it comes a love for life.  There is strong evidence that shows the benefits of happiness, another feeling that comes from joy.  Research suggests happy people have more success, live longer, and have better health because they are more likely to have a stronger immune system.  In one study, over 2,200 Mexican-Americans aged 65 and over were tested for positive emotion, another way of indicating happiness, and then tracked for two years. After controlling for other variables, researchers found that happy people were 50% more likely to live and 50% less likely to become disabled. Read more at Suite101: The Six Life Benefits of Happiness: Being Happy Feels Good and Is Good For  You http://personaldevelopment.suite101.com/article.cfm/the_six_life_benefits_of_happiness#ixzz0gSvig9IZ

Still not thinking about finding joy in your life? If not, I encourage you to do so by taking a deeper look at yourself.  You will be astonished by what you discover,  which will be your true desire to live a joyous life. Joy is a choice and it requires more than your intention, it requires action.  Joy isn’t necessarily happiness, which primarily comes from “happenings”.  For example, an event occurs such as a the purchase of your first home, a marriage proposal, or landing a new job which will stimulate feelings of happiness.  However, the novelty runs out and these things eventually become ordinary, or sometimes more work.  They are now part of your daily life and the happiness soon wears off.   But joy doesn’t require an event occurring to stimulate a positive emotion.  One dictionary defines joy as “the passion or emotion excited by the acquisition or expectation of good; gladness; exhilaration of spirits”.  Joy is a delightful state of being that requires a heightened sense of consciousness and actions.  If your intention is to live a joyous life, then you must take action now. 

Here are 40 sure-fire things you can do to ignite joy into your life:

1: Sing a song

2: Read a book

3: Buy your favourite childhood game and play it.

4: Play your piano

5: Dance your a** off

6: Call up your old friend and reminisce about old times

7: Make your favorite meal and invite friends over

8: Make up a story and tell it to your child at bedtime

9: Run a mile as fast as you can

10: Jump for Joy: Do 100 jumping jacks without stopping

11: Take a vacation, go somewhere different

12.  Tell a joke

13.  Wear a smile on your face for the entire day

14.  Thank your boss for not firing you (you know you haven’t done any meaningful work in a while

15: Kiss your hands

16:  Say I Love You to yourself 100 times without pausing

17:  Watch a funny movie

18: Kiss your spouse for 1 minute without stopping

19: Take dance lessons

20: Plan a block party

21: Wear red and yellow

22: Say I love you to someone and mean it

23: Let someone get in front of you at the grocery store or in traffic

24: Write a poem

25: Chaperon your child’s field trip

26: Bake a cake from scratch

27:  Draw a picture (you don’t need to be an artist to do this, stick figures are acceptable)

28: Complete a 500 piece puzzle

29: Buy a new comforter set

30: Send flowers to your “enemy” ( this can be your piece offering)

31: Listen more, talk less

32: Surprise yourself, do something extraordinary

33: Say your sorry

34: Pay off your lowest credit card debt by the end of the year

35: Save at least 10% of your income (if you’re on a tight budget, save $50 every pay period)

36: Learn a new sport

37: Paint a room

38: Donate new clothing or food

39: Sponsor a child in Haiti

40: Visit a friend or a family member that you haven’t seen in a while