Do you remember those pendulums that hang over a plate of sand and scibe patterns? (It became a Big thing when someone noticed how they move during an earthquake.) But, really, they scribe patterns all the time. We stand on a moving Earth. If I could hang a pendulum from my perineum and stand over a plate of sand, I'd find that my balance is transitory, and yet I feel balanced almost all the time.
I can feel balanced even while I demonstrate that I am not IN perfect balance.
Joy is like that to some degree, though the metaphor is poor.
It is not a place I have to find; not an eventuality if I live well; absolutely not something I earn. To have joy, I must decide to be joyful. That's all. And there are a million ways to do it.
Tai Chi has taught me that balance is transitory and to be effective, in the form or in life, I have to move in certain ways and keep my focus on certain things. Those ways and things can change and often do.
The same is true of joy. Since we are in human physical form on this planet, we get to contend with all the other souls here. And joy is hardly the primary focus of the majority of people here. But it can still be mine. My real 'job' if I have one, it to keep making the decision to be joyful. Whatever I'm doing - whether I think I've chosen it or had it thrust upon me (?!), I can still choose to be joyful.
Today, I'm not chooseing it.
A few of my 'buttons' are rattling and I'm beginning the process of more internal work. I'm not yet quite able to find the joy here; but I do know the joy of coming thru these experiences. And I do still know that I can learn to choose it here, in the midst of this angst, of which I am so fond.
Yep, WIP, that's me.