The gift of the joy bird
I felt like I had lost my sparkle. I didn’t know if it was post holiday blues, or something deeper. All I knew, was I was undeserving of one of my nicknames, Tina Sparkle. I was more like, Tina Lost-Her-Sparkle. Everything felt heavy, including me. I described it to a healer only yesterday, explaining that it felt like my soul was heavy, perhaps with something not from this time. Perhaps I am carrying a grief or sorrow, which was a passenger from one life to the next. Inside a travelling soul. Joy was elusive.
It was a pensive adagio. There was unmarked sadness. I sat with it. Trying to understand it. Wanting it to lift. I lived with it. Put it in the back seat. My determination driving. Waiting to pick up my joyful soul on the long road ahead. Looking for her, hoping to see her standing, framed by the horizon, her thumb out wanting to hitch a ride, joy smiling from within her, greeting the world through the lift of her cheeks and the broadness of her lips. Alas, the road before me was long and absent of what I was seeking. The universe had not painted her in the picture for a while.
And then joy arrived. In a carefully packaged gift last night. Wrapped in bubble wrap. Cushioned by air pockets. A gift carefully chosen. A beautiful Royal Doultun cup, with an illustration of a joy bird. But it wasn’t just this that lifted my heavy soul from its dark, sticky and murky bed. It was the beautiful and joyful words written by a friend. A kind soul. Gifting me joy. Thanking me for the joy I bring to others.
And suddenly I understood.
Joy flows through us. It is ever flowing. From one person to another. There is an abundance of joy. A giant never-ending cupful flowing around the world. Flowing through people. It has no beginning. It has no end. It just flows. One person gives you joy. You give others joy. Joy finds you. You find joy. And I realised in my time of pause, where I have not been writing much, or teaching meditation, or been part of a regular coaching session with others, joy wasn’t flowing through me like before.
I am so very grateful to my dear, thoughtful friend. Who with joy in her heart, gifted me some. Kick started my joy machine once again. Got the flow moving. With a beautiful bird and eight simple words. ‘You bring a lot of joy with you.’
The magic of joy, is that it comes from unexpected directions. It is also something which is not to be held. Joy cannot be caged. You are a platform for it to lift from. Into the world. Joy flies free. I have written in the past about us all being vessels filled with joy. I have written that thoughtfulness, gratefulness and kindness to others fills our vessel of joy and the vessel of joy for others. But a vessel holds something. Contains it. And joy is not to be contained. It is to be spread. To flow. Like a fast moving stream. Joy that is stagnant is not joy at all. Joy cannot me held. Joy flows. We are more like channels than vessels. Channels, which joy can flow freely through. From one person to the next.
A sparkle glitters. Flashes. It is ever moving. Impermanent. That is what makes it a ‘sparkle’. If you try holding it inside, it dulls and dies. Sparkles are momentary and forever moving. That is their beauty and what makes them true to their name. True to their very being. Like the song of a joy bird.
