How to Actually Let Joy and Happiness In

Joy and happiness are often moments in time in our lives. As all emotions are, they come and go. They are meant to start a cycle and complete a cycle. That is what an emotion is: energy in motion.

While I have talked about emotions in general before, today I want to look specifically at happiness and joy.

I want to start by asking you a question: When was the last time you can remember feeling happiness and joy?

I will give you a moment to feel into that.

The next question I have for you is about that specific moment. It does not matter how long ago it was—I am not trying to beat you up for not having enough of it in your life. I am here to give you tools. So stay with me.

When you remember back to that moment, feel into how much space happiness and joy took up in your body and the field around you. Was it small and fleeting? Was it huge and all-encompassing? Or was it something in between the two? How long did that feeling of joy or happiness actually last for you?

We are starting to build a bit of a map now around this one moment. This is how you build awareness of self and relationship with self, which is where we can find points of transformation and change.

The Thoughts Behind the Joy

My next question is about how you felt during the happiness. It might feel a bit strange because you might think, "Well, Tracy, I was feeling happy. So of course, happiness is the feeling."

Amazing. Very true. But was there anything else in there?

Were there any thoughts that you had while happiness was present? Did you have thoughts that were trying to shut the happiness or the joy down? Thoughts like:

•This is not the time for this.

•This is not the space for this.

•This is not correct to be having this at this time.

•We don't deserve this.

•We should be doing something else.

Or were you able to simply allow the joy and happiness to be there?

This is not a right or wrong answer, and it is definitely not another opportunity to beat yourself up. It is an opportunity to understand self—parts of self. That is how we can bring compassion, self-care, love, and change to all parts of us. There is no shame or wrongness in how you felt or what you were thinking during happiness because we can do two things at once. We can have joy and happiness and simultaneously have thoughts telling us that we shouldn't be having it.

Did you let the happiness run its course, or did you shut it down and push it away once it was there?

Meeting Resistance with Curiosity

I work a lot with all parts of self, helping people to understand and heal these parts, and to meet their needs. This is an invitation for a little exercise around how you actually let joy and happiness in. Can you let it be its own thing and take over, or are there parts of you who think you shouldn't have it and don't deserve it?

I am sure you are wondering, how on earth do I change it?

If you are someone who shuts it down, it can happen in simple moments. For example, when your partner comes to play with you and you say, "Don't do that." In that moment, you chose not to let joy in, and you chose not to let your partner in.

Again, we are not going to beat ourselves up for that. What we are going to do is meet it with a beautiful self-tool.

The most powerful tool we have when it comes to healing and noticing parts of self is curiosity. Let's meet these parts of self with curiosity. Be curious and open to the possibilities of allowing more joy and happiness into your life.

If you do have a negative or judgmental thought coming from another part of self telling you that you don't deserve it, that you shouldn't be doing it, or that you shouldn't have it—meet that with curiosity as well. Meet it with openness and invite that part to have the joy and happiness too.

The "Bus" of Self

Visualise it like this: There are many parts to self. Imagine there is a part of me on the bus-the part that is in the driver's seat—that starts to feel joy. But there are three other parts of me on the bus that say, "We do not do this, we don't have time for this, this is not allowed, this is not appropriate right now."

How I would meet that with curiosity is by acknowledging those parts of me. I would look at them within myself and literally think:

"You are allowed to have joy as well. You can join me with this joy. I know we've got to be somewhere else. I know it might not be appropriate. I know that you're feeling like you don't deserve this. But I'd love to invite you to feel this joy with me too."

That is the first step: allowing joy in and working with parts of self to allow joy in.

Expanding Your Capacity for Joy

The next step is when you feel that joy. See if, just for a moment, you can locate joy in your body. Where do you feel it? Is it in your stomach? Is it like a little light that's starting to grow and build? Is it in your head? Where is joy?

Give it permission and the ability to expand and take up as much room as it needs to. Invite your other parts into it and say, "Let all parts of me feel joy right now." Watch it expand and feel it expand. That is how we can be more present.

Mindfulness and coming into the present moment is a wonderful thing, but it only works if all parts of the bus are with you. It is a beautiful thing to invite all parts of self that would like to be with joy right now. Come on in and be with me in joy. Let's expand this happiness. Let it take up as much room as it needs to.

If there are too many parts of you that are shutting things down, then you might need a little bit more help and support on this, which is something I explore deeper in my Self Healer Tribe. But for today, I really would love you to think about: How do I expand my capacity for joy? Am I letting joy in? Am I letting happiness in?

If we are wondering why we don't have more happiness and joy in our lives, this is a beautiful way to inquire about it and open a dialogue with it.

Opening a Dialogue with Happiness

As an extra step, just like when I am working with anger or sadness, you can literally open a dialogue with happiness. You can sit in meditation with happiness and open a conversation with it, or you can open your journal and ask:

"Happiness, what would you like to tell me today?"

And let happiness speak to you. Let it tell you whatever it is that it would like to tell you. Maybe it will tell you that it is feeling a bit left out and would like to take up more space. Maybe it is saying, "I'm feeling a bit abandoned. I'm feeling a bit squished. I'm feeling like I've got all of these conditions around me and I'm not liking it. I would like you to let me loose, please."

You won't know what happiness and joy are trying to tell you unless you ask them.

There are so many little Easter eggs of wisdom in this exercise. The invitation today is for you to take what you would like from this.

If you want to work with me further, you can find me at tracymalone.co or on socials under @XOTracyMalone. Let me know if you have any questions or thoughts on this—I would really love to hear from you.

Until next time, take care of yourself and know that this world is a better place with you in it.