I have been listening to a series of Guided Meditations by Deepak Chopra. In particular, on Spotify it’s called A Series of Guided Meditations by Deepak Chopra with OpenSeed. There is one on Awakening Joy.
Absolutely worth a listen. Each guided meditation is approximately twenty minutes long. My takeaway from this particular meditation on Awakening Joy is this.. I love the idea of visualizing “awakening” joy. I visualize a slow stirring and “waking up” of joy inside us. Deepak has you think of a moment, experience, or a time that brought you joy. And, as you try to re-experience that moment, think about your heart and experience what your heart is feeling. He then has you become present to the feeling of joy – that it came from within, from inside. While we recalled the moment of experience that brought us joy, taking ownership that we can stir up joy and that came from within us. He has us consider that joy is within us and therefore the “grabbing”,“awakening”, “calling”, whenever we want, from the heart. This made a difference for me. I don’t have to look on the outside for joy, to experience joy and while external experiences can be an impetus for joy within us, the feeling comes from inside and we have the ability to conjure it up within us. I’m not sure that I’m capturing the essence of this thought clearly and maybe I need to muse on it a bit, but, for me, I was left with an exciting and empowering thought that Joy is within me, there for the calling and creating whenever I want. The lesson that keeps coming up repeatedly for me is how much ownership I have over my state of life, my quality of life, the feelings that I go through life in day-to-day… I control my state – not much else … and the practice is to remain in your chosen state throughout each day, as best you can, as often you can, through any experience and interactions you have over the day. You have very little control about external circumstances – you have 100% control over how you respond and the person you are being in each interaction, with each human being and in each situation.