As I sit in our motorhome and watch my husband, Chris, of twenty-four years wash the breakfast dishes I find myself content. It is a foreign concept to allow myself this pleasure. Being the daughter of trauma that I am I’ve literally had to work on myself to allow this opportunity. Don’t get me wrong I’m not talking about the money I’ve earned to be in a motorhome or the freedom being self-employed allows us to take off and camp. It’s not that kind of work.
It’s the internal reprogramming of a life of bullshit indoctrinated into me by ancestors, media, organized religion, and society. For most of my life I’ve believed that to have joy or pleasure was not afforded to me because I was _____. (poor, a bastard, white trash, unproductive, uneducated, had a GED, no degree,) The word combinations were endless. If I’d catch myself happy then I’d say, “Woah you haven’t earned that joy.”
What the fuck kind of internal dialogue did I have to say things like that to myself as early as ten?
Now in my early 40’s I’m just breaking through all the deprogramming and learning the truth. You can have joy without contentment, but you can’t have contentment without joy.
Contentment is like the baseline operating mode that you should be most of the time. It’s an emotional rhythm people find and can maintain due to all the little daily choices they make based on their internal value systems.
Joy is when something exceptional happens to spike the baseline of your emotional standard. It’s kind of like the high note of a song. You can’t sing a whole song in a G. You must take a breath eventually and go back down to a tone you can maintain. That’s emotional baseline.
Most people, like me, seem to be in a constant emotional baseline of fright or flight. There is no time for peace or rest because_____. Insert whatever reason. That’s not to say there aren’t good reasons. But if people living in poverty who work every day just to meet their basic needs make time for rest, joy, and celebration. Why shouldn’t you?
Bri Clark 