Cultivating Joy with Brandi Sellerz-Jackson

Joy is a lifeboat for when we are lost at sea or lost our way. It is also the very thing that sustains us in a calloused world. How do we find it? How do we locate it? I write that joy is ready to meet us as much as we are yearning to reacquaint ourselves with it. Here are three ways that I stay connected with joy.

It's often closer than you think

I want you to know that joy is always near. I think of my ancestors and how they could find happiness and even rest during times of turmoil and systemic danger by simply existing. While writing my book, On Thriving, I sat down with my grandmother, Juril, and asked how her mother and those before encountered rest in the segregated south. She shared with me how they would play baseball on my great-grandmother's land and how Sunday dinners after church were how they found peace in a world without peace. I gathered from her that joy is something that is present, AND we have to notice it and grab it as our own. Simply put, joy is ours for the discovery.

It's in the little things

Joy can be found in the ordinary. We often look for an aha or earth-shaking moment that announces joy's arrival. Joy can be found in a cup of tea. It can be found in creating rituals around what may have been deemed non-extraordinary. Yes, there, my friends, is where we can find our friend, joy. It can be found in the giggles of companions and the warmth of a hug. It can be found in the pouring over of honey as it gently dissolves into a mug. I've found joy while making the most decadent oatmeal. YESSSS, OATMEAL!!! The capturing of joy is the gift we give to ourselves.

It takes a little kindness

I find joy in writing. Writing a book is a challenging task. It requires a lot of work. Writing On Thriving required time and self-gentleness. I remember some chapters being more straightforward to write than others. Chapter Nine, I would start, stop, and begin again. At times, I wondered if I would ever feel like what I had written was good enough that I could finally say, IT'S ENOUGH. However, this, too, is where joy lives. It's found as we climb our mountain and when we accomplish something hard. I often find happiness in my deep breath and sigh of relief when completing the writing of a chapter. I find it in my self-gentleness and the result thereof. Joy is present when I am reminded that self-gentleness and not being hard on myself is always the way forward.

However, you find joy. I want you to know that you are worthy of it. This joy that you feel belongs to you. It's yours. So, go out and take it. Here's to thriving.

Written by

Brandi Sellerz-Jackson Birth & Postpartum Doula

Brandi Sellerz-Jackson is a Writer/Author with her first book publishing with Ballantine/ Penguin Random House. She is a Birth and Postpartum Doula, turned Life Doula, and the founder of #NotSoPrivateParts, an online platform centered around removing the shame and stigma surrounding women’s issues.