fmf: joy

Here are the rules:
1. Write for five minutes flat for pure unedited love of the written word.
2. Link back to Lisa Jo Baker's blog with the rest of the Five Minute Friday-ers.
3. Comment on the person who linked up before you.

Please join us!

Today's prompt: Joy

GO

I've always been intrigued by the phrase "choose joy." I'm not quite sure how I feel about it. According to my dictionary app, joy is "the emotion of great delight or happiness caused by something exceptionally good or satisfying."

Sounds great, but not exactly something you can choose. At least, not directly.

If joy is caused by something else, something outside of you, other than yourself, it's not something you can choose. You can, however, set yourself up for it. Follow me on this. It may get a little rough, because I'm still working it out myself as I go. That's the whole point of Five Minute Fridays, right?

I'm currently reading "How to Expand Love" by the Dalai Lama. Brilliant, but that's another post in itself. One of his biggest points is that you may not be able to change the behavior of others, but you can change how you view it. Now, I don't believe in reincarnation, but I'm fascinated by his explanation of it in this book. If, in fact, we are reincarnated an infinite number of times, as is everyone else in the world, then at some point, every person on this planet was once your mother, father, brother, sister, child, best friend, etc. Therefore, in a past or future life, you loved them so much that you would give your life for them. Crazy, right? Using that train of thought, it makes sense that you should want to extend love to them, even if they have hurt you in this life.

I don't know if you've noticed this like I have, but the more you love on others, the more you get back. Now, that doesn't always make it easy, because some people just won't seem to want to be decent to you no matter how nice you are to them, and some people just make it plain old hard to be nice to them in the first place, but keep trying. Sorry for the cliche, but you really do reap what you sow.

And if you sow love all around you, isn't joy going to be a natural byproduct?

STOP