Tag: joy

Why is joy so fleeting?

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Personal Development, Self help techniques

Here’s a video blog looking at why joy is so fleeting and ways to be able to feel joy more often. Enjoy!

Joy is an emotion that occurs when you are totally at peace and living in the Now. You are not thinking about the future or the past or what you need to do later in the day. 

Joy is the sheer pleasure of being present and attentive to the moment at hand, and whatever is arising. Few of you can stay present for very long. You skip all over the place with your thinking and therefore joy is lost. 

It takes focus, immersion, surrender and acceptance for joy to be present. It is not a doing or an efforting, it is an ease, a relaxation into what is.

The questioning mind keeps you away from joy. The judging mind sends it away further. All these mind activities keep you stuck in the head and away from your heart, which is where joy is felt. So you can’t have lasting joy unless you can rest in your heart. When you can do so, you see beauty and joy everywhere. 

You see it in nature, in the sunshine, in dogs playing, children laughing. You see it in life and its busyness and you see it in the faces of those who are eating cake or ice cream or who are on an endorphin high after exercise. Joy is everywhere when you are in the receptive state to see it, feel it and receive its vibration.

That means your heart needs to be peaceful and for many of us, that isn’t the case very often. Many people have hearts full of emotional pain, yet to be released, full of fear and mistrust, confusion and pain, doubt and loss. There are lots of emotions and painful thoughts or beliefs leading to and perpetuating these low vibration emotions and energies. People’s bodies are filled with these issues creating emotional density or baggage. The heart is weighed down and joy which is very light is not felt.

It can be felt temporarily when you do something that stills you, that takes you to your heart and to enough inner silence that you can hear the heart’s message. This might occur during meditation, a walk-in nature, holding a baby or a beloved pet. Whatever it is that takes you inside yourself and quietens your mind, then you can feel joy.

Joy can last and become your predominant experience, once you have cleaned out the emotional density and ceased reacting to the events that occur around you. 

If someone cuts you off in traffic, you don’t have to get agitated or angry. You can stay calm and peaceful. It’s a choice. A habit to break and a decision to choose differently. Even if someone is in your face saying unkind things, you don’t have to react with fear or with anger back. You can just stay centred, send love to your heart and your inner child, and choose peace. You can send the person love and acknowledge their power, for that is what they are truly seeking, to be seen, heard, acknowledged and accepted. They are hurting inside and lashing out. Don’t deepen their wound by reacting badly/painfully, send them love and help them heal. If you can do this, you can maintain your state of balance, peace and joy, no matter what you encounter.

It is possible, you just have to learn to do so, to be able to step back and witness what occurs and choose your reaction. So monitoring your thoughts and being quiet enough to hear them, is an important skill to learn in order to have peace and joy all the time.

If your body automatically reacts with exaggerated fear responses to situations this is a signal that you have trauma inside that needs to be released. Your body is reacting as if you are in severe danger when you are not actually in danger.

A door may bang, a raised voice might occur, a car backfires and your body goes into freeze, into hypervigilance and defensive reactions. This is a sign that you need to comfort your body, connect inside and release that stress, tension and trauma, so that your body can relax, become more peaceful and able to relate to others, to live in more joyous and open ways. While your body feels there is a threat, danger, it won’t relax fully. This makes it hard to have sustained joy as your mind is preoccupied expecting danger and scanning for it.

The scanning for danger distracts you from the moment, the stillness, the joy of being present to what is. It keeps you activated, primed ready to respond to whatever does occur. It can be exhausting even though nothing bad is actually happening.

You can use Tension and Trauma Release Exercises (TRE) and other embodiment activities to help you to clear out the stress, tension and trauma in your body, so it is easier for you to be in the now, to relax and to enjoy life. TRE activates the body’s natural, inbuilt mechanism for releasing stress, tension and trauma. It helps to calm your nervous system, to come out of freeze, fight and flight, back into calm social engagement, where you feel safe, can relax and play with others and enjoy life.

It is well worth learning TRE to help you be calm, playful and joyful as you move through life. It does take some time for your body to reach this state. You have to clear out the old stuck energies so the new lighter energy can enter. Thankfully with TRE, you can do it at home, whenever you want, as part of your self-care process. Once you have learned how to self-regulate your TRE you can do it on your own, for free, for the rest of your life. Your body will thank you for it!

Even if you temporarily lose your cool and need to balance back up, you can do so quickly if you don’t berate yourself for it. You can simply notice that you reacted, learn from it, heal whatever button or event it triggered from your past and vow to react differently in future. Love yourself and the situation for the healing it enabled. Thank it and let it go. No need to hold on to it. No need to beat yourself up for slipping or not being perfect.

You are human and you are evolving and growing each day. Each day moves you towards having greater peace and joy in your life. The recipe is clear, less doing more being, less judging more accepting, less resistance more allowance, more fun and creativity, more stillness and going within, more practice and friendships – more sharing and growth. All of this adds up to a life full of joy and happiness, being of service in whatever way feels right to you. 

Blessed BE. Amen. May joy be in your hearts now and always. So be it.

How to accept divine timing and your growth rate?

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Conscious Evolution, Personal Development, Self help techniques

It is not up to you how fast growth occurs. It takes a lifetime to achieve the growth your soul has come to experience. Events will occur to create the shifts needed, for awareness to dawn and self love to occur. This will all happen at the destined time. You can not influence it. You think you can by going to that workshop, doing that healing, but we tell you it still occurs as needed. It is your soul guiding you forth. It is your soul giving you the urge to do the workshop or healing. It is all occurring as it needs to.

Let go of the judgement, the impatience and flow with the process, accept what comes and what goes. It is not up to you. People will come and go out of your life, behave in certain ways to trigger you. Everything that is needed for your growth will come, because it has to for you to evolve as needed this lifetime.

You can’t get it wrong or miss an important event or person. It will all occur as it needs to. You just judge it with your mind, assuming you should be doing more or be more advanced by now. There is no more advanced, there is no better than or worse than, don’t compare your self to others. Don’t assume how you should be is anything other than how you already are.

You humans make it so hard for yourselves. You are determined to see yourselves as not good enough, but this is just your thoughts, just your conditioning. Change it, so you are accepting of yourself, so you know you are exactly where and how you need to be right now, so you can be kind and loving to yourself. That is what is needed so you can enjoy the process more, so you can enjoy the journey.

You will get where you need to be regardless, but you affect your experience of it with your thoughts. You create suffering and angst with your thoughts and judgements.

If you’re struggling to cope with the stress of your daily life you can use a wide range of tools to help yourself release the stress, lighten up and enjoy life more. When you do this it is easier to accept what is, as it is no longer all consuming, all pervasive. the challenge is balanced by your doing more relaxing and enjoyable activities as well. Whether it’s time alone, time in nature or with friends, whether it is exercise, dance or doing something creative. Find what makes your heart sing, helps to cheer you up, refuel you so you can keep moving forward day by day. Do what you love and it makes it easier to bear nearly any circumstance you face.

If you’ve experienced heartbreak, trauma and loss that has devastated you then you may need a different kind of support. Whether that be guidance and support from a counsellor or use of embodiment activities like Tension and Trauma Release Exercises (TRE) to help you reconnect with your body, shift out the stress tension and trauma, so your body and nervous system calms and you can finally have peace within. There’s lots you can do to support yourself as you face whatever challenges life brings you.

Accept what is and flourish. Deny it and struggle. Rally against it and feel helpless, depressed or worse suicidal. Accept what is, knowing it will pass, that it is just a phase of growth and you will have peace. Accept yourself and your journey and you will have joy. Accept those around you and trust they are guided forth in their process, that they are all doing exactly what is needed for their evolution and growth, then you will have love overflowing in your life – from you to others and from others to you. Accept what is and have peace.

Foster greater acceptance and trust, faith that it will all work out okay and you will have excitement, anticipation and positive feelings of the future. The choice is yours create negative feelings with your thoughts or positive ones. The same outcomes will occur, just your experience of it, your sense of joy or suffering will differ. Which will you choose? It is entirely up to you. Blessed BE , Amen.

By Jodi-Anne M Smith (21 April 2017).
Further free guidance on healing techniques and self love are available on the Life Insights and Healing from child abuse pages of this website.

How to let life be fun?

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Healing from child abuse, Personal Development, Self help techniques

Life can be fun if you let go of the seriousness, the shoulds and have tos. You can still achieve your tasks, but in a more relaxed way. Take the time to smell the roses, to notice the leaves moving on the trees, to be present to the sun on your skin and the feel of the wind in your hair. Be in the present moment and allow what is to be felt, enjoyed and valued.

Too few of you value or even notice the simple pleasures in life. You are rushing from one man-made construction to the next, one scheduled event to the next. You push yourselves way too hard and are then depleted energy wise, with no reserves left to go play and have fun. So you collapse in front of the TV or numb out on your electronic devices, passing time in a way that while acceptable to you is really a dull version of what is possible if you met with people face to face.

Meeting face to face, in person, allows true connection and touch, a warm hug, a laugh and genuine smile, a gladness for your existence and theirs. It enables your hearts to connect and open and for love to flow. You may just go for a walk or sit and talk, it doesn’t have to be an expensive or fancy activity. Just being together can be fun and it is this connection that most of you crave.

deserve good lifeMany people are very lonely. They sit alone at home and feel sad, unloved, bored and uninspired. They could do anything with their time, but they don’t know what to do, so they do nothing and then feel even more blue. Make the most of your days. Reach out to others and connect. Call a friend, see if someone is available for coffee. Your to do list can wait. You are allowed to have some time off. You deserve it, you are worthy of it, and you can have it. You just have to choose.

Go the museum, the zoo, the theatre, there are a thousand things you can do, just choose. Make a list of things you would like to try and do them one by one. It can be easy and fun. It doesn’t have to be complicated. You can choose to enjoy life and have fun each and every day. It is up to you.

The baggage and habits that hold you back, that keep you stuck in the same old space, won’t disappear over night, but it will get easier each step you take. Take those steps, take that leap of faith and trust life to bring you all you need to survive, to serve, to thrive, for life can be fun, you just have to let it be so. Alter your thinking and actions and have fun. It is so good to do.

When you have fun your heart smiles, chemical endorphins are released in your body and your body feels better, healthier, happier. Fun is good medicine. Have some today and every day!!! Take the pressure off of yourself and live a simpler life, where you value yourself and others, where you connect more deeply, where you love each other and are there for each other.

Enjoy life more and thrive. Let the good life in. It is always good, it is just our thinking that makes it seem otherwise. Challenges come and challenges go. These help us evolve and awaken to love, to life lived as a vessel of love, being of service to all. It takes time to heal and release your past hurts, your conditioning, but it is worth the effort. It truly is. Having fun can be easy when your body and mind is at peace, relaxed and present in the moment.

When your body is tense, stressed, or traumatised it is harder to be in the present moment. Part of your energy is tied up in the past, in worry or anxiety, in fear and frustration. You can release this underlying tension and discomfort quite easily using Tension and Trauma Release Exercises (TRE). TRE is your body’s natural mechanism for shaking out tension, stress and trauma. When your body and nervous system relax back out of fight, flight, freeze into relaxation it is much easier to enjoy life and have fun as your body is open to it. It feels safe to relax and play, to interact with others and to enjoy life.

Take action to resolve your past hurts and conditioning, so you can have that inner freedom and peace, that natural joy. You will reach that space in time, for that is what the process of life is, a cleansing of the heart to enable evolution, raising of consciousness, and becoming the embodiment of love – to vibrate at that frequency consistently and manifest Heaven on Earth. It can be done. It will be done. You will see and soon. So be it. Amen.

By Jodi-Anne (15 August 2016).
Further free guidance on healing techniques and self love are available on the Life Insights and Healing from child abuse pages of this website.

Why is joy so fleeting?

by Dr. Jodi-Anne M Smith, posted in Self help techniques

Joy is an emotion that occurs when you are totally at peace and living in in the Now. You are not thinking about the future or the past or what you need to do later in the day. Joy is the sheer pleasure of being present and attentive to the moment at hand, and whatever is arising. Few of you can stay present for very long. You skip all over the place with your thinking and therefore joy is lost. It takes focus, immersement, surrender and acceptance for joy to be present. It is not a doing or an efforting, it is an ease, a relaxation into what is.

The questioning mind keeps you away from joy. The judging mind sends it away further. All these mind activities keep you stuck in the head and away from your heart, which is where joy is felt. So you can’t have lasting joy unless you can rest in your heart. When you can do so, you see beauty and joy everywhere. You see it in nature, in the sunshine, in dogs playing, children laughing. You see it in life and its busyness and you see it in the faces of those who are eating cake or icecream or who are on an endorphin high after exercise. Joy is everywhere when you are in the receptive state to see it, feel it and receive its vibration.

That means your heart needs to be peaceful and for many of us that isn’t the case very often. Many people have hearts full of emotioal pain, yet to be released, full of fear and mistrust, confusion and pain, doubt and loss. There are lots of emotions and painful thoughts or beliefs leading to and perpetuating these low vibration emotions and energies. People’s bodies are filled with these issues creating emotional density or baggage. The heart is weighed down and joy which is very light is not felt.

It can be felt temporarily when you do something that stills you, that takes you to your heart and to enough inner silence that you can hear the heart’s message. This might occur during meditation, a walk in nature, holding a baby or a beloved pet. Whatever it is that takes you inside yourself and quietens your mind, then you can feel joy.

Joy can last and become your predominant experience, once you have cleaned out the emotional density and ceased reacting to the events that occur around you. If someone cuts you off in traffic, you don’t have to get agitated or angry. You can stay calm and peaceful. It’s a choice. A habit to break and a decision to choose differently. Even if someone is in your face saying unkind things, you don’t have to react with fear or with anger back. You can just stay centred, send love to your heart and your inner child, and choose peace. You can send the person love and acknowledge their power, for that is what they are truly seeking, to be seen, heard, acknowledged and accepted. They are hurting inside and lashing out. Don’t deepen their wound by reacting badly/painfully, send them love and help them heal. If you can do this, you can maintain your state of balance, peace and joy, no matter what you encounter.

It is possible, you just have to learn to do so, to be able to step back and witness what occurs and choose your reaction. So monitoring your thoughts, being quiet enough to hear them, is an important skill to learn in order to have peace and joy all the time.

If your body automatically reacts with exaggerated fear responses to situations this is a signal that you have trauma inside that needs to be released. Your body is reacting as if you are in evere danger when you are not actually in danger.

A door may bang, a raised voice might occur, a car backfires and your body goes into freeze, into hypervigilance and defensive reactions. This is a sign that you need to comfort your body, connect inside and release that stress, tension and trauma, so that your body can relax, become more peaceful and able to relate to others, to life in more joyous and open ways. While your body feels there is threat, danger, it won’t relax fully and this makes it hard to have sustained joy as your mind is preoccupied expecting danger and scanning for it.

The scanning for danger distracts you from the moment, the stillness, the joy of being present to what is. It keeps you activated, primed ready to respond to whatever does occur. It can be exhausting even though nothing bad is actually happening.

You can use Tension and Trauma Release Exercises (TRE) and other embodiment activities to help you to clear out the stress, tension and trauma in your body, so it is easier for you to be in the now, to relax and to enjoy life. TRE activates the body’s natural, inbuilt mechanism for releasing stress, tension and trauma. It helps to calm your nervous system, to come out of freeze, fight and flight, back into calm social engagement, where you feel safe, can relax and play with others and enjoy life.

It is well worth learning TRE to help you be calm, playful and joyful as you move through life. It does take some time for your body to reach this state. You have to clear out the old stuck energies so the new lighter energy can enter. Thankfully with TRE you can do it at home, whenever you want, as part of your self-care process. Once you have learned how to self-regulate your TRE you can do it on your own, for free, for the rest of your life. Your body will thank you for it!

Even if you temporarily lose your cool and need to balance back up, you can do so quickly if you don’t berate yourself for it. You can simply notice that you reacted, learn from it, heal whatever button or event it triggered from your past and vow to react differently in future. Love yourself and the situation for the healing it enabled. Thank it and let it go. No need to hold on to it. No need to beat yourself up for slipping or not being perfect.

You are human and you are evolving and growing each day. Each day moves you towards having greater peace and joy in your life. The recipe is clear, less doing more being, less judging more accepting, less resistance more allowance, more fun and creativity, more stillness and going within, more practice and friendships – more sharing and growth. All of this adds up to a life full of joy and happiness, being of service in whatever way feels right to you. Blessed BE. Amen. May joy be in your hearts now and always. So be it.

By Jodi-Anne (4 June 2016).
Further free guidance on healing techniques and self love are available on the Life Insights and Healing from child abuse pages of this website.