Joy Isn’t a Distraction. It’s How We Heal.

Lately I’ve been thinking about what happens the day after the storm.

After the protest. After the news breaks. After a hard conversation.
The world is still tilted, still uneven - but there’s a strange quiet, too. And in that quiet, we get to ask ourselves:

How do I live, even here?

Last week, I wrote about fear. About how the current climate…politically, spiritually, socially…has been stirring up old wounds in new ways. So many of you wrote me back with your own stories of fear, grief, and exhaustion.

And also… a few of you wrote to say,

“I still laughed with my kid today.”
“I still put on the red lipstick.”
“I still danced in the kitchen.”

It reminded me of something I forget too easily: Joy isn’t a betrayal of the moment. It’s part of what gets us through it.

We’ve been taught to treat joy like a reward.
Like it’s something we earn once the world is safe again.
But the truth is, most of the joy I’ve ever known came in the middle of pain, not after it.

I think of the people who held my hand when I came out.
The first time Clare made me laugh so hard I forgot what I was scared of.
The look on Merit’s face when she bursts into a room, already mid-sentence.

These are not after the pain moments. They’re within it.

And that kind of joy? It’s not naive.
It’s not accidental.
It’s not ignoring the truth.

It is the truth.

Because if all we ever do is respond to the world’s cruelty, we forget that we were made for more than surviving. We were made for beauty. For laughter. For belonging. For mornings that begin again.

So if you’ve been feeling the weight of everything, and also finding pockets of light, don’t forget to hold them both.

Don’t apologize for your joy. Don’t shrink your smile. Don’t wait to celebrate.

This world needs more than our pain. It needs our presence.

And joy, real, rooted, lived joy, is one of the clearest signs that we haven’t given up.

So keep showing up. Keep feeling it all. And when joy comes knocking, let it in.

Let it all the way in.

Photo by Jacqueline Munguía on Unsplash