Work is something of a dread for many of us. We generally see it as a box to tick and something that we must get through to get by in life. We sometimes even think of being in another job or position within the company or someplace else and convince ourselves that will bring back the spark to what we do. We may even seek to undertake jobs that we know in the past brought us some satisfaction, such as turning a hobby into a fulltime career: for some this seems to work well but unless we are living a fullness of joy in whatever we do, we seek reward and or satisfaction instead and then, are we living less than what we could in life?
Let me explain. Life ought not to be mundane. We are not here on Earth to plainly exist and this certainly does not make sense to why we would be here and the potential we all know in our hearts we can bring to life. So many of us know innately – especially when we are young – that there is so much potential in us to live. Not necessarily for what we can do and what we may become, but more so for the simple joy of experiencing ourselves, that is our true selves, in whatever we do.
I have witnessed joy in so many children for doing the simplest of tasks, from tying their shoelaces to even going to the toilet or going for a walk. These basic tasks may seem boring to many as just part of living, but these same children grow up to be adults one day saying just the same thing as most of humanity in claiming that these tasks they once found great joy in doing are now just part of everyday existence.
So where does this joy go?
Is it hiding under the sink? Or under the bed? Or what about tucked away in an attic somewhere? It does not just disappear simply because we get older and get too grown up for seeing joy and playfulness in these simple tasks. Sure an assignment or work project may have many dollars riding on its importance of being completed, but this does not make it necessarily more important than enjoying the wonders of tying your shoes for example.
These projects, complexities and apparently greater aspects of life do not need to take precedence over the quality of our being, especially how we feel within ourselves. I know that it can be hard to see the joys in the simple things in life when you have just failed a big test, exam or project, or even do not know how to complete one of these. Even if you don’t have such projects of importance in your life anymore, it does not mean that at some point in your life you have not been affected by life placing such pressures on you.
What we do generally when these pressures are placed on us is we tend to react because they are often given to us in such a way that makes us feel that we have not been met or seen for who we are first. Life then seems more important than the quality of our being and suddenly that joy we innately know is seemingly less important than anything else in this world. After all, you are not going to pass a test or exam purely based on whether you feel joy-full in yourself or not.
We tend to check out from ourselves and our body and see the mind as king in this world and our body as runner-up to anything else.
But what if this form of behaviour is in fact what is causing us to feel that the joy in our day is gone? The key difference between how we live as adults and how we live as children is our level of connection with ourselves and our body. Perhaps what the key to experiencing joy again in our day, at even the smallest and seemingly insignificant things such as tying our shoelaces, is about being present again in our body in the moment and feeling that we can be totally and absolutely embracing of whatever that moment offers us.
What if life is just that simple, yet our heads acting on their own have made even the smallest of issues more complex than they ought to be?
You are probably thinking right now that this is crazy talk, as how can our body have any intelligence at all, especially considering it is the mind that seems to make this world tick… or is it?
Does the mind even care about the body it lives in when it is living in disconnection from it? A classic example is not going to the toilet when needed – whilst the body skids and squirms in its seat, shouting at an ignorant mind it is in obedience to. I can remember doing this so much at school because I was not always allowed to go to the toilet when I needed to or I felt embarrassed so I would not go and would often almost have seat-bum-burns from having to skid around holding on in my seat too much!
Indeed when we are in disconnection from our body and then reconnect back to it, we do feel the ugliness of how we have really been treating it. But what if there is a joy of being with you in your whole body and not just in your mind. It would certainly mean you don’t have to worry about that project due tomorrow, or the cat having to see the vet next Tuesday or having to pick your mum’s washing up from the dry cleaners this Saturday, whilst you squeeze in a mountain of work due before this weekend all whilst washing the dishes!
So could this indeed be the simple answer to our lack of lustre and vivaciousness in life?
I know for me this is in fact the case. Going from hard out study-o-holic to living the absolutely delicious man I am, all I have changed is my own relationship with my body and hence with myself, learning more about myself and how I have been living that has not always been in line with my body’s truth.
Could this be your truth too?
For me it all started with a simple use of the Gentle Breath Meditation™, and this was inspiration enough to change my whole life. The Gentle Breath Meditation™ was introduced to me by Universal Medicine and is a very simple, practical way of re-connecting with ourselves and our body. It is available in many forms depending on what is needed by you in that moment.
By Joshua Campbell, 25, Software Developer, Belgium
Further Reading:
Being Still – With Joy
The Joy of Gentle Exercise
The Illusion of Happiness – Finding the Joy Within
The Truth about Universal Medicine 
My parents were always very reluctant to stop the car for us to have a wee. Classic and very simple example of mind over body. My Dad truly believed that it mattered if we arrived 3 minutes later than we planned…meanwhile my body going into tension….but, more damaging, instilling in me a habit of over-ruling the messages my body was giving to me. To start with when I became a dad, I was the same with my kids! But letting this go and allowing the flow to flow (pun intended!) has been a joyous release of this locked in pattern and one of the zillion ways in which my children have inspired me to re-parent myself.
I recall how over the moon I was with my first couple of jobs. It meant so much to me on so many levels to be let loose in the adult world, be able to interact, input and at the end of the day get rewarded with some money for what I would have considered doing for free! It was uncanny the number of people that made concerted effort to correct what they thought was my “naive outlook” and enjoyment of life.
There comes a time when we realise that the misery we feel at work or in a relationship is coming directly from us and the outside world is merely offering a reflection. Then it is up to us to let go of blame and simply make different choices.
Love being you – and then whatever it is you do comes with joy because you are enjoying.
There is endless joy when life becomes about being who we truly are…rather than focusing on what we do.
I was asked the other day if I get disheartened as time supposedly goes by faster as we age. I replied no… and it made me appreciate how much my life has changed with so much more joy for being alive – irrelevant of age! This has only come about since attending Universal Medicine presentations and being inspired to develop more of a relationship with myself that is far less dependent on outside influences.
When we are in the flow of the present, work and life is indeed a joy, full of purpose and commitment bringing the all.
The simplest of things in life hold the greatest joy.
So true Henrietta… there is joy in the smallest of details, and what might seem the most insignificant act can bring the greatest joy.
Joy does not hide under the sink nor behind the door … as it can only ever be found in our own hearts or in the heart of another seen through the depth of their eyes. But even when we know this to be true deep within, we still seek it outside of ourselves, we still seek it under the sink or behind the door! When will we stop this endless search and just look within? This simply happens when we are ready to embrace joy again.
Joy is in the simplicity of our living, just when we are present in our movements
I always found preventing kids from going to the bathroom during lessons at school absurd… Is this the way to treat them with respect and equality?
Life is not mundane when we are young, it is full of wonder and joy. By reconnecting back to my body and my sense of feeling I have recaptured much of that wonder and joy again, but it’s not yet consistent. Bringing presence to my body more consistently and spending less time in my head will support the change!
The head is so highly praised – ‘a great mind’. And the body too, but often because it’s being pushed to the limits in one way or another. This is so simple but yet so challenging or difficult for people to see sometimes. It’s not my job to show or tell people this, but it is my responsibility to live a life which honours my body – and if someone is inspired by that and makes a change to their lifestyle or how they live, that’s awesome.
Work is the most loving thing for us to do. Our bodies are made to work and to work a lot of hours. It offers us purpose, an opportunity to connect to other human beings and work together. In fact often we don’t do very well on (too much) spare time especially on the aspect of how we treat our bodies when we are free from work. And yes with every move we make and every breath we take connection to our body is vital and the key to joy.
Beautifully said Monika – and in this we also get to feel that ‘work’ does not have to be the four letter word that is it often seen to be, but instead can be the three letter word it was always meant to be: ‘Joy’!
This is very sweet and simple, to appreciate that there can be joy in the smallest of details in life, whilst we still continue to take care of the bigger things like work, family practicalities and group projects.
Thus – “God is in the detail”
If we need to find joy we have already lost it. Our natural state of being can be joyful. We just need to drop all the other stuff that we have put on top.
Up until 12 years ago I felt all my joy had been squashed flat by all I had experienced in life. However, soon after meeting Universal Medicine, the joy started to re-inflate itself in response to the very gentle, powerful self help tools provided and over time has returned to its full shape and quality within me, a miracle seen on a regular basis in all those who also study and apply this incredible work.
“What’s Happened to the Joy of Life?” – what’s happened to us being decent and respecting with each other too. There is no joy when there is abuse.
Joshua this is such a great blog for everyone to read because we can get to feel just how far we have come away from the simple joy of experiencing ourselves and what that feels like. We have left all that behind in order to get a secure job with money coming in to support ourselves and our families. In other words we seem to have made life all about money and education as a precursor to a secure job not about the joy of just being ourselves no matter what.
My Dad used to say “if you enjoyed it, then they wouldn’t pay you”. There is such a fixed set of beliefs instilled in us that work is work and play is play. No wonder we so easily accept a life devoid of joy, since neither this kind of work, nor certainly this kind of escapist play will bring true joy.
I love how even the smallest of jobs can bring so much contentment and satisfaction when we do it with all that we are. Even taking the rubbish out can be enjoyable knowing how it supports everyone in the house and feels like a fresh start. I used to work in a retail store and often faced up products and most people would hate it but I came to see the difference it made and how when everything is in order not only is it easier for people to find things the whole place or area feels so much more inviting. And we either leave an imprint of disharmony, anger etc.. where ever we go or one of love and I know which I would rather leave and then be greeted with to walk over!
It’s very beautiful to be reminded of the fact that we can all re-connect to the joy we felt as a child through our connection with our bodies – but it doesn’t end there – the knock on effect from living from our body is enormous when we are open to being guided by what truly supports us, rather than what we think we want.
Yes the reality of what we choose is so in our face when we realise we basically are the master of our misery. The flip side being we are just as masterful at being aligned to joy.
“The key difference between how we live as adults and how we live as children is our level of connection with ourselves and our body.” Re-gaining connection to and living from our ‘boy mind’ rather than our head is a sure way to the joy we had as children.
‘These projects, complexities and apparently greater aspects of life do not need to take precedence over the quality of our being, especially how we feel within ourselves.’ – when they do, bit by bit, we get knocked down and pushed out of the way, until we can’t feel our gorgeous selves anymore – that when life starts to feel mundane, when we are missing the joy from feeling our selves first.
Finding joy in the simplest of things brings fullness to life.
When we build our whole life around material possessions, status and accumulation of wealth we can arrive at old age with nothing but a feeling of emptiness. True wealth and joy is an inner quality founded on our connection to God.
When we stop living entirely for ourselves we will discover joy.
What makes us to dismiss the joy in the mundane task we all have every day? Why have we made it mundane while we consider that with us doing these tasks we give our imprint with it and thereby magnify the love that lives in us? As children we could sense this energetic truth, but most of us have lost this in our childhood, e.g. in the education system we were taught that it is all about the mind, about logical reasoning that let no space to feel the energy we are living in and with. Is it possible that we are trying to cover up something, that we are so much more than we live. That we live a lesser life than the spark of love that is our innate source. To me there is a possible answer in this lack of joy in simply living life and to get on with it.
The inspiration is when we let go of the attachment of what gives us joy, we can then enjoy all of Life and not compartmentalise and check out ourselves, which is limiting our own expansion and the world’s.
Joy is a confirmation of who we truly are. And who we truly are – is love – for love is our very essence so to be in joy is to be in connection with our essence..
“We sometimes even think of being in another job or position within the company or someplace else and convince ourselves that will bring back the spark to what we do….” yes, but as we find out, the grass isn’t always greener on the other side, and often shifting places, is only a transference of the same-same unless we deal with what is at the core of why we avoid connecting to the spark…
Joy is natural when we live from the stillness within no matter what we are doing.
True Fiona, and to be able to connect with this stillness and to be with it all the time and to feel the joy of it, we have to let go of all the ideals and beliefs we have built our lives upon as these keep us busy and do not allow us to be with that stillness inside.
Last night my mind thought it was ‘king of the world’ and it ate what it wanted. Today my body is feeling the consequences of that – sinuses blocked, bloated and gassey. My body does not think my head is ‘king of the world’ when it does that. A learning for me to not separate the two so much!
Beautifully profound blog Joshua and I love the fact that you have raised the topic of joy. It seems as we get older we do leave our joy behind – it is usually crushed out of us by a world that does not care about who we are only what we can do and produce and create. So great you are talking about this and that we can reconnect back with our natural joy we had as children simply by being more connected to our bodies and the intelligence and wisdom they hold.
Lost our joy of life = first loosing our true connection with ourself and the Gentle Breath Meditation is a very good place to start to truly re-connect with ourselves.
The fact that life is mundane for so many of us, is simply a sign that we have shut down the multidimensional aspect of who we are to such a drastic extent that we have made life into the most basic functional existence imaginable. But life has the absolute potential to be utterly glorious for us all and that resplendent state is our birthright and one that each of us will eventually return to. It really is just a matter of how long we each choose to procrastinate in returning to it.
We have access to Heaven, what could possibly be more joyous than that?
Joy is the most natural state in the world and so the fact that the world is so utterly void of joy, is a pure reflection of just how unnaturely we’re choosing to live. It’s simple, by living in the way that nature intended us to live, we reinstate the joy.
Whilst we’re all on the lookout for joy, can we please keep our eyes open for love, stillness, and harmony whilst we’re at it, as they also seem to have gone missing!
I have a feeling they are all hiding together – perhaps if we find one we find the others too…
‘I have witnessed joy in so many children for doing the simplest of tasks, from tying their shoelaces to even going to the toilet or going for a walk.’ I’ve always loved being with children when they are in the wonder of the world and themselves. It’s like they have such a beautiful connection with themselves that is also felt with the whole world. Just a simple walk can take half a day when you stop to appreciate all the magic you come across – a bee on the path, an ant to follow etc.
‘It’s like they have such a beautiful connection with themselves that is also felt with the whole world.’ – love this – it’s so true. Children offer us a gorgeous reflection of what it is like to feel your self in connection with everything else – their world is totally spherical.
‘What if life is just that simple, yet our heads acting on their own have made even the smallest of issues more complex than they ought to be?’ This is so true Joshua, stay with our body and feel its impulses, and life flows with amazing congruence.
The Joy of being ourselves and then when the expectations come we start to lose sight of the joy and before we know it we have chosen to leave that joy and settle for a life that is empty of who we truly are.
When I stop having fun during my day I know something is not right.
You share this so simply Joshua, I love your question: “What if life is just that simple”? When we take a vacation (in both senses of the word!) from the body a small thing can get blown up into an issue rather than staying with the simplicity of that relationship.
Young children are a great example when you are fully present in each moment, life is anything but mundane. I am at times struck by the power and absoluteness expressed through their little bodies as well as the delicateness and transparency. It is silly that we complicate life as we grow up with ideals, beliefs and strategies, then try to manage everything so that we gain some semblance of the joy, vitality and openness that would otherwise be our true expression.
It seems the moment we divorce our way of living from feeling everything from the heart and body to working life out and thinking from the head, our sense of joy and spontaneity we knew as kids falls by the wayside.
There are lots of ways that kids and adults seemingly differ, but they all seem to boil down to what’s expressed in this blog: that generally kids tend to be living in and with more connection to their bodies than adults. But no matter the extent to which we may have shut ourselves off from our connection to what our bodies are always sensing, it’s not an irreversible decision made once. If we’re always sensing and feeling, then we have to work hard to not be consciously aware of that, by putting a lot of stuff – emotions, behaviours, etc, – in the way.
The search for satisfaction and reward is a never ending one, always making us seek the next and the next. true fulfilment can only come from within and when it does, what we do does not matter at all for we bring the joy that we are to everything we do.
So true, I realise the more that I live from within the less investment I have in results as life becomes simplified the way it was as a child.
What you show Joshua and I love your example, is that there is nothing more important than staying true to ourselves, and not seeing things outside of us as more important than the connection we have. When we bring it back to the simplicity of a multi million dollar deal should not be any more important than how we tie our shoe laces then we can see how out of proportion and out of kilter we run our lives. It is also a great reminder for me to not put too much importance on any one thing.
‘We tend to check out from ourselves and our body and see the mind as king in this world and our body as runner-up to anything else.’ Learning the relevance and importance of the body has been life-changing for me. Understanding that all my thoughts are fed from whatever source I choose to align to has enabled me to surrender more and more to the knowing that is already there deep inside. Choices are so much simpler to make when I trust the wisdom my body holds.
When we are living true to ourselves we cannot help but be joyful.
So conversely also a beautiful reminder for us of when we could benefit from a moment of stop to check where we are at and then to move on from our truth once more.
It’s important what you’ve shared about giving all parts of our lives equal attention, and allowing ourselves to enjoy life and it’s in-between moments. If we put too much energy into constantly ‘delivering’ projects, work etc., and neglect our relationships, then the joy can be absent.
Well said Susie, its important to give everything equal attention and not put more focus or attention to one area if it means neglecting another as everything we do affects everything else. So let one area go and we will inevitably let all areas in our life go. And as you say its the in between moments that are equally as important as they are what prepares us to deliver whats next.
This is the clincher for many things … “unless we are living a fullness of joy in whatever we do, we seek reward and or satisfaction instead and then, are we living less than what we could in life..” …which keeps one looking outward for that stimulation, reward, a feel-good event or food… on a ‘merry-go-round’. We step off that merry-go-round once we connect to our body and know this endless love, joy and settlement within is with us in whatever we do.
Yes Joshua, I felt butterflies in my stomach as I read “absolutely delicious man I am”. It always touches me very deeply to see a man hold themselves in such a tender way. Thank you.
It is only when our minds and bodies work in unison that we experience joy.
Elaine I thought life was good but there was always unrest, it was exactly what you share and only when I focused on my body did that unrest go and Joy take its place.
Yes, Joshua, life has fleeting moments of seeming happiness on the roller coaster ride of highs and lows when we abandon ourselves. We only experience a consistent state of joy when we are connected to who we truly are.
Changing our relationship with our body definitely has the potential to change our life, as you have so beautifully shown Joshua. And in the changing of our lives the joy that has always been a natural part of us is able to surface once again and change our life even more.
It’s so true. Joy comes from a simplicity. If we can simply be with our bodies we can find joy in that.
We can tell when the joy has gone from someone’s life, which is mostly everyone these days because it’s as if this misery takes over and that life is far too important and serious to be joyful. Many of us walk around feeling burdened by life and see joy as an impossible, unnecessary or childish thing that only children are privy to because they have no responsibility. This is part of the lie we adopt as we grow up and lose that wonderment we had as a child. We haven’t actually lost that wonderment and joy; it’s still there, we have lost the connection with our bodies we had so naturally as a child.
“You are probably thinking right now that this is crazy talk, as how can our body have any intelligence at all, especially considering it is the mind that seems to make this world tick… or is it?”
I have just looked this up on the internet as I remember some research that had been conducted a few years back about the intelligence of our hearts.
“The scientists at the HeartMath Institute (HMI) have conducted extensive research on the power of heart intelligence, intuition and the energetic connection between all things.”
So what you are saying is not crazy at all Joshua.
“… shouting at an ignorant mind it is in obedience to” So much more than we appreciate. Our bodies are slave to the emotions and thoughts we allow to run riot through us. Learning how to connect to a steady energy within us brings us back into obedience with our bodies and an intelligence we have yet to truly fathom and fully appreciate far out weighs our mind led version.
I love my job and have done for many years, i do remember what it was like to live for the holidays planning my year ahead and living break to break. I do feel rather than change professions I could now love that job as much as I love my current job because I would see the purpose in it.
“Not necessarily for what we can do and what we may become, but more so for the simple joy of experiencing ourselves, that is our true selves, in whatever we do” – love this line Joshua, we are as a human being in life an experience to explore, to deepen and to treasure to know who we truly are.
Great title and question, one I am sure most people have asked including myself. It is when we ask these questions so much can be revealed, and from the insights we can make small changes that lead to more changes and so on that support ourselves to feel that joy again. Accepting who we are and where we find ourselves in life is part of that too, in the knowing that we create our life by our choices.
Who is an expensive gift bought for a child, really for? When the child had more fun with the box, it came in?
So much of my childhood was joyous, in the true sense of the word. And now so much of my life is joyous in exactly the same way as when I was a kid. And the reason why I am experiencing the same joy again, is because I have returned to living life from the absolute simplicity of my body.
Joy confirms as it expands and expands as it confirms.
Joy is the simplist of feelings derived from the simplist of things.
For me my sense of joy comes from my very basic connection with God and as that connection comes through my body, then yes Joshua joy is very much to do with ‘being present again in our bodies’.
“The key difference between how we live as adults and how we live as children is our level of connection with ourselves and our body.” Yes Joshua I absolutely agree! So why do we loose or give up on this wonderful connection? What is happening when we are growing up? I can only speak for myself – I was not able to live all my joy and the deep connection to my body as most people around me were not living it anymore and I did not want to stand out and feel alone. Therefore it is so important to support our children in being joyful and connected with their bodies by living it to the best of our ability so that they have the reflection that they are not crazy at all.
Life as we know it is built on the lie that we will be happy ‘some day’. When the reality is we can all know joy TODAY 🙂
Beautiful blog Joshua, and that difference you call out between being an adult and a child is so our connection to our bodies, for children the body rules and is listened to while as adults we ignore it or expect it to operate as a slave to our mind … and yet it’s our body which speaks and knows the truth and it’s with our body that we feel and experience life, so time to change our paradigm to be the body the whole body and not just the mind.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if instead of being tested on whether we have got something ‘right’ or not we were encouraged to be joyful for this is our natural way.
Being in connection with our bodies is a very intimate feeling. It is greater than if we face challenges and it is great to face any challenge with, in fact, it is necessary to.
Seat bum burns! 😳 yes there is definitely no joy in that! Thank you for reminding me of the importance of Joy! … and listening to and loving our bodies. With a child everything just is, there is no stress. I remember as a child there would be times I was so happy I would sing everything instead of talk. I found this really fun but I think it used to drive my family nuts. However with more and more young people and children being diagnosed with depression, half this alone tells us how we are living is not right.
I love my work. That makes a big difference every day to my life.
“….all I have changed is my own relationship with my body and hence with myself….” If this is all it takes to turn ones life around from being one that does not have any joy in it to one that is joy-filled, it seems crazy that so many of us resist making the choice to do it.
When I let myself be in the moment and enjoy the task at hand, I actually really enjoy myself and get energised by what I am doing. However, when I am thinking about the next thing that I have to do and the list of un-ticked things I have to do, then I begin to lose the joy when I wonder how I am going to get all that done. But the thinking is my undoing of the joy. Usually I find that I get it all done anyways, so, as you are saying Joshua, I might as well in-joy what I am doing so that I bring back the essence of life in the simple tasks that I need to do anyways.
Thank you Joshua for a great reminder of how we do have that connection within us – we have it as a child, but then we often forget about it and make life mundane, but none the less it still lies within us simple waiting to be awakened.
I remember having a young child in the back of my car and they were trying to put on their seatbelt. It was taking some time so I turned around to see what was going on, and in this beautiful life moment, the child laughed out loud with so much joy and said ‘i was trying to put in the wrong one – the whole time!” and laughed some more and then proceeded to put in the right one. I learnt so much from that moment – one like you raise here, that there is so much joy to be had in any one moment, and two – even when you seemingly make a mistake, there can be joy. There was no giving themselves a hard time. just a giggle and a laugh and a correction.
Joy is so innate in us as children… the wonderment in small things and the ability to live in the moment without thinking of the next. Living this way as adults would certainly shift things a lot!
Worrying about or overthinking the past or the future does take the joy out of being present with our whole body as we do whatever it is that we are doing in that moment.
As a Students of The Livingness Elizabeth, I concur, it is never to late and may I add early in life to reconnect to our essence, inner-most or esoteric all one in the same.
I used to think I have to achieve this or that, get to a certain goal or point in life in order to feel joyful. But now I realise I can be joyful at any time and anywhere. All I have to do is connect to my body and allow joy from within to flow. I can feel joyful by simply connecting to my body, for example by connecting to the delicate touch of my fingertips and to the way I hang the washing out etc. We have been sold that joy is something we have to seek and that it is outside of ourselves, but the truth is, joy is always within us and it doesn’t go anywhere, we can simply connect to it and it’s there ready and waiting for us to tap into.
So what is it about starting out being gentle as in the “Gentle Breath Meditation” that can return us to being “joy-full”? The feeling one gets is that we can lose our connection to our body and thus True ‘joy-full-ness,’ so then we need a bridge to return as in the “Gentle Breath Meditation.
There is always Joy to be had, even in serious situations.
“The key difference between how we live as adults and how we live as children is our level of connection with ourselves and our body.” True and when we re connect to our body and feel the connection with God life becomes simple again and the innocent joy we knew from when we were a child comes back.
It is really beautiful when we see children taking great joy in simple tasks. We can learn so much from children and their ability to be fully present.
It is often a healing for me to see children being absolutely present in something they do and the joy that comes from their inner expansion is almost palpable.
Comparison of adults and children reveal so much about how our way of living changes. When I read this here I felt the difference in the way we learn. As children, this is full of wonder and joy but when we are older this becomes something we have to do to meet what is required of us. Although many can’t wait to leave school this is not really possible as life itself is a school and an ongoing series of lessons for us to learn from, lets’ embrace this with the same wonder and joyful way of being we were born with and observe in children and bring this to every situation, including our work.
Imagine what a society would be like if we valued and thus graded educational tests on how joyful one felt. “Your great at maths but where stressed out throughout the test – F” It doesn’t matter how much we know, knowledge one does not make us joyful.
An inspiring blog Joshua – love the simplicity you share in returning to re-connect with the body with the Gentle Breath Meditation as a starting place. From experience – this does make a difference and opens the way to the most mundane of tasks being done from a quality of joy!
“I have witnessed joy in so many children for doing the simplest of tasks, from tying their shoelaces to even going to the toilet or going for a walk.” I was reflecting on this only yesterday, I could feel the essence of the now grown woman as I felt how she was as a small child in the things that she did, totally focused, connected and intimately with the tiny delicate movements of her fingers, her settlement and stillness palpable. It is a joy to observe in all children, and something to nurture and confirm.
Love what you bring here about a presence in the body. It is something we don’t bring to our day enough and perhaps this will reconnect us to the joy that is on offer in each moment.
What a joyful celebration of enjoying our body and being present in it and the sparkle this allows in our lives whatever we do and wherever we are in connection with our innate essence.
If we are enjoying ourselves, in whatever we are doing, then there is joy and purpose in our lives.
I know from experience that even a most mundane task can be fun when I give my all. I can really get off on being me.
Spot on Fumiyo – and the other day I went to brush my teeth and was busy thinking of other things so that when I finished brushing my teeth, I felt like I had not really been there and done that and it felt incomplete as an activity as I had not stopped to be in the moment and enjoy myself. So I went back and brushed them again, this time with more presence and joy too! I had to laugh at how simple this can be and yet how quickly we can let this slip out of our day to day lives.
I have not got past the first sentence that most people dread work. I have to say that I have always absolutely loved work and in fact see my life as one and generally don’t differentiate between work not work… now I will read on and see if you arrive there too!!!
ok I have read on and get to the bit about the joy children experience in the little things. I too have that absolutely joy at 61 now – in fact more joy than I remember having as a child and I don’t find anything in life mundane…I’m even having fun talking to myself here… I will read on….
So now I have reached the end, and yes I can agree with you in that I have a greater connection to my body than ever before and more joy and magic in my life than ever before so there does seem to be a corollary there!
If we are honest there is a vast difference between the joy we felt as a little child and the joy we feel as an adult. It has less spark I think. I rarely see adults skip along the road for no reason whatsoever, or collapse on the floor holding their belly in fits of laughter just because something made them laugh, but I know I still have that potential inside me if I simply give my playfulness permission to come out unapologetically.
“what if there is a joy of being with you in your whole body and not just in your mind” – This is a great question Joshua. There is joy in unity and brotherhood, not in separation.
That connection, of mind and body as one is fundamental of we are to know joy.
I was making beds at my workplace last Thursday with so much contentment and joy and wondering to myself how could this be, as I was doing a supposedly menial task, loving every moment. Goes to show it is not what you do but how you are in your body that determines whether you be joyful and content or not.
So true MaryLouise… there can be a joy and contentment within us, and then whatever we do thereafter comes with that quality – no matter how grand or insignificant the task may be.
Super example Mary-Louise and true, no matter what it is we are doing, when we are connected with our bodies, everything has meaning and purpose and so a contentment is felt in our bodies and the joy is natural.
Perfect example Mary-Louise of what is possible when we deeply care and love ourselves. The supposedly ‘menial’ tasks can have equal purpose to our perceived more important jobs.
The more I connect to my essence within and my body and the deeper I allow this the absolute Joy my life is. A Joy I never knew was possible.
Same for me Natalie, I too am able to connect to my essence and feel the joy from within. I no longer seek joy from outside of myself or in anything I do, and this is one of the biggest stumbling blocks I have discarded which has made a huge difference to my life. From feeling miserable to now feeling more joyful than ever before and now I know there is always an opportunity for me to deepen my connection to my essence and therefore deepen my connection with everything else in life. There is no end point to joy, it just keeps expanding.
Yes, the big surprise is that this is our nature – just as it is for little children.
A practical example of when we feel a bit bored at work is to come back to the body and make it playful. Sometimes I do this with my hands or my feet and then suddenly it’s as if I’m back tying my shoes as a young child – in the wonderment of it all.
Our bodies are wonder-fully responsive when we connect with them in a loving way… the joy is innately there, waiting for us to reconnect to and show the world it is within every one of us too.
This is so pertinent to where I’m at. I easily go into a racy mind with what needs to be done today – how to complete it all without resorting to tried and tested way of being in stress, of being resentful that I have to go into stress mode to get it done knowing the horrible effects this has in my body. There are also meetings and tasks I’m unsure I can manage or do so again, I have tried and tested ways of getting through them that also aren’t loving.
I have been allowing quality in my work but it’s time to expand this to all aspects so this becomes my norm and the old ways fade. The only way to do this is by being present in my body, let go of being ruled by time and observe what happens. Let’s see what happens today then.
Hi Karin, it is FUN and super joyful to be present in your body – you even make that sound like a drudge and some sort of work you have to do. At first if we have not been present for a while it does not feel so great, but even when it does not feel great it feels great to feel it not feeling great, because there is nothing worse than being disconnected and therefore there is a joy in the connection whatever you feel.
“Does the mind even care about the body it lives in when it is living in disconnection from it?” A great question Joshua and there are so many examples when we override what our body is asking of us – from delaying going to the loo, as in your example, to eating and or drinking the wrong substances that we know in truth don’t serve us at all and prevent us from being all that we truly are.
The mind most definitely does not care about the body, evidenced by extreme sport, addiction, obesity etc we travel far from what is supportive the more we do what want which is driven by the mind’s desire.
Yes, Joshua, the moment that life becomes more important than the quality of our being we are missing the point. The source of love and joy in each moment comes from our connection to soul, and this cannot be replicated or substituted by any of the outer trappings and man-made creations we make so important.
Beautifully expressed Janet, this is my experience too. The greatest joy is from connecting to our Soul and to God, there is nothing outside of us that can compare to this level of joy that we can connect to from within.
“The key difference between how we live as adults and how we live as children is our level of connection with ourselves and our body.” Yes and this is one of the things in life we are here to learn that when we stay in connection with our body our mind no longer has the power it thinks it has and that working in unison with the body is the only way forward and offers a totally different life to the one of ‘getting by’ and functionality. There is an absolute joy in the effortless learning of life through the body, that the mind alone cannot begin to comprehend.
“The key difference between how we live as adults and how we live as children is our level of connection with ourselves and our body.” So true Joshua. Spending time with my young grandchildren these weeks they are totally in their body 24/7 and have so much energy and vitality. That’s all there for us as adults too – we just have to uncover the layers we have built over that joy.
When we re-connect to ourselves the mundane goes out of the window as everything reignites with a purpose and a reason for doing it. Even the jobs we have to do suddenly become enjoyable.
I totally agree with you James and if we choose the other option of checking out when doing the mundane, no joy will be found there.
The Gentle Breath Meditation is a true life changer, one that empowers us to return to the joy inside us and tenderly re-build our relationship with our best friend, our body. And once that begins to appear, so too does our joy, a steady loving quality that we can then carry with us through every task in the day, be it a big work project, cleaning the house or collecting mum’s dry cleaning!
Love what you have shared Rowena, as it is not a complex equation that keeps us from our essence and the ‘joy-full-ness that is available to everyone equally.
Re-connecting to and living from that innate joy we have as children is joy indeed.
We deeply miss the joy and connection that we had as children. It has been amazing to be building a relationship of undertanding, intimacy, connection, honouring, respect, care and ultimately a more loving relationship with my body. I am now learning how to nurture and care for myself, and this feels foundational to what we are here to learn.
Just this morning I had the biggest smile on my face and felt such enormous appreciation for how amazingly intelligent and supportive my body is. I was getting dressed and due to not being able to bend over without it being very painful, from my cracked rib, instead, without thinking about it at all, my leg lifted up my foot, allowing me to put on my socks without my having to bend over as I normally do. Sounds like such a simple action, which it was, but it came totally unprompted and ‘un-thought of’ from my gorgeous body, it surprised me how spontaneously clever and caring my body is.
I love how simple the equation is – that living in a way where we are connected to our bodies = joyful. This blog made me consider again why we are here. It really can’t be just to be successful in life with family, friends, work. There is far more to why we are here and we certainly knew that as children when we were going about our lives connected to ourselves, our bodies and present in what we were doing. And hey presto – a lot of joy.
Love this blog Joshua – thank you. It is true, the more I make my life about the connection to myself and my body, the easier and stress-free it is. It’s not that I’m not aware of emotions such as overwhelm, anxiety, tension etc, it’s just they don’t get a hold on me like they used to because of the commitment to deepening the relationship and connection to my body.
Love, love, love what you are sharing here Joshua and I can confirm from first hand experience how much joy we can experience from simply being present in our bodies and enjoying all that that relationship brings. I cracked a rib last week, which, if you’ve never experienced it, is very painful, however, it’s being a wonderful learning experience as I am having to be very present in all of my movements and going to a whole new level of care and gentleness with myself.
Perhaps Josh the answer to the Joy of life lies in what you pose here “The key difference between how we live as adults and how we live as children is our level of connection with ourselves and our body.”
What if Joy is naturally something that is there when we are in connection with ourselves and something that is waiting for us to re-connect with. It can seem a million miles away when we are not connected and yet in an instant is there.
The quote from an old timer; Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in our life, describes joy.
Very true Steve, and something I have found is pretty much any job I can enjoy and love so long as I am taking myself to it and being me. The moment I go into trying to be something or impress anyone or watch the clock I start to pick flaws in it and make it purely about the task at hand and getting it done and all the magic and joy goes.
The turn around for me in relation to my work was understanding that it’s not about the job that I do, but the quality in which I do my job, whatever that may be. Feeling the joy of being with myself first allows me to enjoy whatever I do.
The reward that we seek, lets say having a glass of wine at the end of the day exposes the lack of connection and love to ourselves but it doesn’t have to be a glass of wine or eating a whole bar of chocolate! It can be simply doing nothing as a way to check out and drop what is being asked of me for relief as a reward for what has gone on during the day.
When the mind is king and the body the servant, we have an existence that is topsy turvy and upside down; it’s like a tree with its roots in the air and the branches and leaves underneath; it does not make sense and we forego the joy and expansiveness that presence in and with the body bring.
The pressures of life can suck the joy right out of us especially if we try and live up to the pictures we have been sold about how life should look instead of how it feels in the moment.
Great that you mention this because it is seen as normal that some parts of life we enjoy and some parts we don’t enjoy and that is how it is. But what if there is a way to simply enjoy all parts of life because we like being ourselves?
Great question Lieke, this is how I feel sometimes. It would be amazing to live in a way that allows us to feel joyful in every moment. I know this is possible because I have met people at Universal Medicine who lives a deeply joyful and loving life consistently, and I am totally inspired by them.
Yes everything we do is joy because it is us doing it 🙂
We feel the joy of being our selves first, before anything else and this is what we bring in all that we’re doing and what we share with everyone else – in this sharing the joy expands even further in a beautiful ripple, within and outside our selves.
A great question to ask Joshua ‘What has happened to the joy?’ And your example of the joy children feel completing the simplest of tasks shows us how far we have strayed as adults. We return to joy by living life from the inside out, deepen our relationship with self and when we do life is never mundane
The only thing holding us back from feeling the joy we felt as a child is our selves and our propensity to ‘leave our selves’ in order to ‘fit in’ with the way of life being lived around us, rather than choosing to re-connect to our truth and our best friend, our body.
We tend to make life a dread, difficult and above all not joyful but what if this is not true, that life can exactly be the opposite? To make human life work here on earth we have to work, we have to go to school to learn the skills for a profession, we have to use technologies to support It.
It is just needed to make human life possible on this planet we live on. It is about the quality we are living all of this, and how much we can appreciate ourselves but also all other people living as human beings on this planet, that they are trying to bring their all to society to the best of their ability too as innately we know that we have to work together to make it work. When we are able to see life from this angle there will definitely be more joy in life as we will then be able to recognise that we are all one and the same and that there is purpose to life more that just to do this at times boring tasks we have to do over and over again.
We are already learned from young, especially on schools where we are taught that we have to negate the body for instance if we have to go to the toilet we have to wait until the pause. But also, that when the teacher is not connecting with us, with our body we do feel that and actually are in pain. But we are told to stay in our seat, bring our attention to the lesson and do what we are told to do. All examples of how from oung we are trained to neglect the body by overriding it by the mind.
I must admit I have never found household chores exciting, especially when other people in the house don’t help. I react and go into martyr mode and that’s not great because the imprint I leave around the house is harming. Your blog inspires me to feel my body first, connect deep within, and then I can enjoy that connection whilst doing what needs to be done. Connection first before anything.
It is a joy to live and to learn as learning growing and expanding is what we are here for.
Yes Kathleen, a joy it is when you understand that life is about growing and expanding together back to a way of life we once lived before. But when we are tricked by our mind that tells us that life is hard and a chore then we are in a complete different realm but still living on the same planet with a mindset that is void of this understanding of the grandness of our being
A great question to ask Joshua ‘What has happened to the joy?’ And your example of the joy children feel completing the simplest of tasks shows us how far we have strayed as adults. We return to joy by living life from the inside out, deepen our relationship with self and when we do life is never mundane
The impulse to learn is like oxygen and foundational to a life fully lived.
The other day my 10-year-old son stepped up and decided to do some cooking at the stove. Oh, my! The joy on his face that he had managed to cook something was so gorgeous. He reminded me of the joy of having these small moments as a child too – suddenly being ready for something or realising I could do something that I felt I couldn’t before. I feel this same kind of joy now when I have a moment of a new awareness. I may not show it in the same way my son did, but it is there nonetheless.
I agree Kathleen, when we understand this, then life becomes deeply joyful and fun.
In the classroom, I have observed how an inspiring teacher can captivate a group of restless teenagers. When we can communicate and engage with kids in a way that makes sense to them or in a way that inspires them you can literally feel their enjoyment of learning. It is a shame to say that many kids by the time they have reached 13 or 14 have shut down to this joy of learning – an indictment perhaps of how we deliver their education.
What a belief that we have taken on in that joy is only the privilege of children and not adults? This is a complete fallacy, because when we connect with our bodies there is not always, every day, in everything we do. Even in the challenges we face in life, and these are constant, when we have a relationship with this body, our minds see challenges in a totally different light and instead of being knocked down depressed, we can keep our joy in such learning, knowing the purpose of life is much deeper than our eyes can see.
The weekend and evening outs seem so alluring and are all we can wait for. Yet these events are nothing better than a relief – and just as joyless. For joy does not apply to one particular day or activity – it’s more like a frequency of a radio station we can tune into. Makes a change from StruggleFM the station we mostly listen too.
Joy is a quality of the Soul and if we are not connected to this part of us and thus ‘in joy’ with it, then how will we ever en-joy life and all it offers to us on this path of return?
A lovely play on words. I often want to write ‘in-joy’ your birthday rather than enjoy your birthday because I can feel there is a playful difference between the two that quite simply feels more genuine.
There is no greater joy than knowing we are the children of God and that our every move here on Earth can be dedicated to this re-turn so that we once more live and express the true godliness we are and are from.
Like a candle that can never be snuffed out, so too does the spark of God forever burn deep within the hearts of us all.
Beautifully said Liane… the spark of love is ever-present.
We seem to think that the joy we have and live as children does not belong to us as adults and that we can’t live in a way that every moment is joyful. All the ‘stuff’ of life seems to get in the way. However we do not need to consume ourselves with the stuff or allow our experience of life be determined by it. We can make joy part of our daily life if we so choose to. But it does begin with us.
When we keep life simple and connect to our inner-most and divine self, life is never dull. We don’t have to load our lives with ‘stuff’ and must dos, letting go of all that is not true is the path to joy.
Awesome blog Joshua, I have often wondered where the joy has gone in life and from what you’ve shared and from my own experience, I realise joy is very much within us all. I am learning to reconnect to my body and allow the joy to flow in and out. There is no need to suppress joy or to hide it, it is to be lived, expressed and shared with the world.