The theme for the third week of Advent is “Joy”.
To be honest, by this point in the year, joy isn’t usually top of my list of emotional experiences. I feel the still-lengthening nights. Weariness hovers around the edges of my being. I do not want to shovel the driveway One. More. Time. And this year, everything I read and hear about events politically and globally makes my heart ache.
Last week I heard someone give words to a desire to experience joy “as big as my sadness and my anger.” I share that longing. The heavier emotions feel overwhelming some days. It’s hard to remember that they’re not the only only ones that exist.
It is easy to feel smothered by sadness, and continuously stirred up by anger. Neurobiology attributes this to “negativity bias”. We are biologically hardwired to give more attention to the difficult things in our lives than those which are delightful. Thus, by our very biology, the more uncomfortable the emotions, the more “weight” they carry in our awareness. When they show up, we know they’re there.
By contrast, joy is more subtle, and more fleeting. In her book, Atlas of the Heart, Brene Brown describes joy as “sudden, unexpected, short-lasting.” She also describes it as “high-intensity”, but in my experience, the intensity is counterbalanced by how quickly it passes.
We feel the delight, and then routine concerns reclaim our attention. Or we notice the unexpected burst, and then the sadness moves in right behind it. And yet, like twinkly Christmas lights, those little bits of joy can have a bigger impact than we realize. They don’t eliminate sadness or anger, but they can lighten the experience.
There are times where it’s really hard to see the joy. That’s why I think the third week of Advent matters—it reminds us to be intentional about noticing the joy. In the Advent wreath, the candle for this week is even a different colour than the others, a reminder to me that I need to make the effort to pay attention to the joy, no matter how small or brief.
Neurobiology also teaches us that what we give attention to grows. When I am intentional about noticing the little bits of joy, it opens my awareness to more of them. The more I notice them, the more of them I feel.
Making a point to notice the joy is not diminishing the importance of the weightier emotions. It’s actually what strengthens our resilience and fuels our endurance to continue to meeting the sadness and the anger. Brene Brown writes, “Joy expands our thinking and attention, and it fills us with a sense of freedom and abandon.” Aren’t those qualities exactly what we need when life is hard?
The fact that joy shimmers while sadness overwhelms also reminds me of the importance of making space for all of my feelings. I need the counterbalance of delight when grief is weighing me down. I need to create opportunities for fun, even for just a few moments, when life just feels hard or I’m being constantly reminded of the injustice in our world.
This is, for me, the invitation of Advent—remembering hope, peace, joy and love even when everything around me feels dark and heavy, tending the between spaces with gentleness, and remembering that the Light always returns.
May joy bring some glimmers for you today.
