The calendar page flipped and we find ourselves in a brand new year. Frankly, I am having trouble dredging up much excitement or enthusiasm for it. That said, I have plenty of foreboding, so, that’s something.
My generation and the ones that follow are left holding the bag on some gigantic, existential, and possibly intractable problems.
Facing the stakes and immensity of these problems, it's easy to fall into doom and gloom, present company included.
I would hazard to say that doom and gloom are the default response when you really start to wrap your head around problems of this magnitude, not to mention their implications.
Without resorting to hyperbole, these problems include: the backsliding of our democratic government and many others around the world, the climate catastrophe that is affecting all life on earth in ways that we truly cannot fully comprehend let alone predict, and the ongoing sixth mass-extinction event in the earth's history—human caused!
Anyone would read that list and feel called to weep.
And once they dried their tears, they would likely become righteously angry.
That anger might well inspire action: One might evaluate and change their own behaviors, write their government officials demanding policy changes, lobby businesses contributing to these problems, or, at the very least, bitch on social media.
Some of these are more effective than others, but there is an underlying flaw with this plan in general: Anger is a source that burns us up as it fuels us.
Righteous anger has a place. It can inspire tremendous action (see: the Civil Rights Movement), and yet, if it is the only thing that fuels us, it will hollow us out inside.
The trouble with the problems that we are facing on what can feel like every front is that they are too big to solve if we rely on the fast-burning fuel of rage.
So...what's left given that weeping isn't known for being a source of action?
To face problems of this truly incomprehensible magnitude, problems that will take all of our lifetime and many generations beyond to solve (whatever that means), we need something that sustains us for the long haul. Something that nourishes us.
Joy may be that fuel.
Many of us subscribe to the fantasy that we are rational beings. We like to think that we make choices and take action based on facts and data. Now, our choices and actions may be informed by facts and data, but we are driven by emotions.
Without emotion, without feeling some kind of way about a fact or action, there quite literally isn't enough to get us off the couch. House on fire? If you feel fear or pain, you will move; if you feel nothing, you won't.
Based on four decades of working with people of...various dispositions, I have a pet theory that intense, sustained action must be motivated by a core emotion. And which emotion is motivating that action matters.
Joy is a core emotion. It not something we have to learn or make up or grow into. It just is.
As with many things that are truly primal, it is there whether we see it, whether we acknowledge it, or not. Just as the sun doesn't actually go away when a thunderstorm rolls in, joy is always there. Sometimes it is occluded, but it never goes away. And just as a ray of sunlight can break through clouds and seem like some sort of miracle, so too can joy break through even the worst of situations, even if only for a tiny, passing moment.
Joy is an emotion that fuels us. It tells us what we should be working toward, what is good in this life. It tells us what we need more of1.
As joy fuels us, it also fills us up. Anger burns us from the inside, but joy lights us up, somehow without causing us to burn in the process. Joy inoculates us against the real, inevitable stresses that we experience in life. Anyone who has spent time with a wee human can tell you, they are exhausting creatures. And also, a giggly baby is about the most infectious source of joy in the human experience. It doesn't make interrupted sleep, infinite laundry, or the challenges of keeping alive a creature that needs to eat constantly (and can't do diddly squat about it themselves) any less work, but the joy and wonder the wee bairns bring make that endless work much more bearable.
And as the tiny bundles of infinite work repay our sometimes grudging, often exhausted kindness with joy, they endear themselves to our tired, fragile hearts. Sharing joy bonds us with our fellow humans.
A community built from anger alone is a heartbeat away from becoming a mob. A community built from joy does not generally lean in the torches-and-pitchforks direction.
Joy brings us together, it tells us what is good and right, it opens our thinking enough that we can begin to imagine what could be. It fuels us. Sustainably. This is what we need to work on the problems in this world.
We will have plenty of anger, plenty of grief, sure. That comes with the territory. But we must always leave room for joy; we must seek it and snatch it and share it at every opportunity.
The stakes are just too damn high not to.
To quote climate activist Dallas Goldtooth:
It's easy to fall into this cynicism and negativity, but humor and joy is a way for me to process all of that in a way that's generative, [...] It's building something rather than tearing something down.
In order for us to radically imagine a different future, we have to imagine and allow ourselves to experience the joys of this world and see ourselves being happy in the future.
[...]
I say that, but I also [know that] nothing drives people more than anger [...] but I don't think we're going to see lasting change until we find joy in the future.
We don't all have to organize with a smile. But we have to be mindful about what's calling people in to build collective power, and we can't ignore the inherent power of using joy and using laughter as a way to heal and build that power.
You may be thinking, "aren't facebook/twitter/x/the Russians manipulating our feelings of joy or pleasure to make us do things?" And you would be correct. And those same entities are also breaking into our anger, fear, disgust, and any other lever they can pull to get our attention and clicks to further their own agenda. This isn't a problem unique to joy or pleasure. Bad actors have found a way to benefit from pressing our buttons, and so they press them until we break. I don't have an easy answer for this, but starting with a Media Fast and doing a Digital Declutter are a good place to start getting a handle on your own emotional rudder.
So happy to have your wise and thoughtful words back in my inbox. Thank you for this post!