Collecting Delight

At times, through bouts of gloom, existential overwhelm or bearing the weight of global injustices and daily stressors, we may question—how anyone could find joy these days? With a shift of perspective on the meaning of joy, we might actually realize it’s been with us all along. 

Poet, essayist and educator Ross Gay offers:

“joy is the mostly invisible, the underground union between us, you and me, which is, among other things, the great fact of our life and the lives of everyone and thing we love going away.”

…

“...joy is an ember for or precursor to wild and unpredictable and transgressive and unboundaried solidarity.”

Gay explains that joy isn’t soft nor superficial. He illustrates joy as a mechanism that ignites de-alienation and solidarity. Joy is also fundamentally entangled with sorrow. Which begs the question: “What if joy, instead of refuge or relief from heartbreak, is what effloresces from us as we help each other carry our heartbreaks?"

Through “The Book of Delights,” Ross Gay offers a practice of cultivating joy through noticing and describing daily delights. This delight-collecting is more complex than gratitude or a positive mindset—although those can be delightful. Joy and delight uphold the concept of radical acceptance, through which dichotomies are transformed into dialectics. Gay even explains the dialectic dance of the word delight, meaning “out from light” and sharing etymological roots with delicious and delectable. Delight is both of light and without light. 

Honoring delight awakens our shared humanity, our mattering and our wholeness. We can reinvigorate unifying joy through practicing the real delights of being. I invite you to notice, share and listen to delight as a conduit for joy. May our ability to hold delight, darkness, joy and sorrow inspire caring action towards ourselves, others and our environment. Because, delight–and joy–comes in “simply sharing what we love, what we find beautiful, which is an ethics.”

My recently collected delights:

-the rosy hue of the tree branches preparing for spring

-a flock of teenagers laughing at the bus stop

-mixing paint colors 

-teaching yoga at the jail 

Recommended reading & listening:

The Book of Delights: Essays by Ross Gay 

Inciting Joy: Essays by Ross Gay 

On the Insistence of Joy, Ross Gay — The On Being Project podcast 

This month Looking Glass Counseling is proud to support Massachusetts Immigrant & Refugee Advocacy Coalition (MIRA). MIRA is the largest coalition in New England promoting the rights and integration of immigrants and refugees. With offices in Massachusetts and New Hampshire, MIRA advances this mission through education and training, leadership development, institutional organizing, strategic communications, policy analysis and advocacy.

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Lia Simonds, LICSW, E-RYT is a trauma-informed therapist and yoga instructor whose clinical practice is grounded in a commitment to social justice and personal agency. Lia values collaborative learning and growth within the therapeutic relationship. She uses an eclectic, relational and playful approach to nourish a client’s connection with self, others and the natural world. 

Lia is versed in guiding individuals through life stage transitions, trauma reactions, mood disorders, relationship issues, loss, experiences of psychosis and social anxiety. Her clinical practice incorporates creative, family systems, narrative, somatic and attachment-based modalities. She draws upon her background in community mental health and her understanding of human development to support clients access internal harmony and purpose. 

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