My February Core Desired Feelings

**Trigger warning: anxiety, depression**

Truth time. I’ve been having a really hard time this first month and a half of 2020. My symptoms have been on overdrive and I’ve been crippled by pain more days than not. And although I hate to admit it, this physical pain is taking a serious toll on my mental health. I’m finding myself feeling worse anxiety and incredibly dark, negative emotions than I have in quite a long time and they’re so dark and so strongly holding on that I’ve asked for help because of them.

With all this going on I find myself craving only one core desired feeling this month, and that is JOY. I’m craving joy in every facet of my life in any quantity possible. Joy is such a powerful force at raising vibrations so I find myself regularly checking in with myself to find activities that bring me joy. I try to do little things every single day that bring joy to my life, even if it’s just for five minutes a day. Reminding myself of the things that bring me joy works in multiple ways at raising my vibration. My vibration raises just from doing those activities. But also, when I’m thinking even more about these activities they’re front and centre in my mind and the more you think about good, the more you feel good. And in an even bigger way, when you think about things that bring you joy often, you attract more of those equally high vibrational things into your life. It’s really just a magnet for good once you start the ball rolling.

To be completely honest, this is some of the hardest and exhausting spiritual work I have done so far in this lifetime. When you get into a depressive state it’s easy to get swallowed by it. It’s easy to just accept that you will always feel like you’re walking in a dark cloud. It feels like it’s just easier to not feel joy than to be open to feeling incredible pain. This past month I’ve felt more emptiness and simply not being able to care about things that previously brought me incredible joy than I have in a very long time; which is what makes this so difficult.

Experiencing joy is an active practice. Joy doesn’t just appear, you have to seek it out and work to bring it to you. So in order to truly experience joy, you have to do the work. Sit with yourself and journal about what brings you joy. Write out all the things you can think of that you find fun, that are exciting to you, that light you up. All of it.

This month is all about joy. Whatever brings me joy, I will make sure I have more of it. It doesn’t have to be complicated or take a lot of time, it just has to be meaningful. Take small actionable steps to bring more joy into your life. Take care of yourself. You deserve the best February of your life, and that includes lots of joy. So here’s to a joy filled, purposeful February. Cheers!

RESOURCES

Danielle Laporte: DanielleLaporte.com

Twitter: @DanielleLaporte

Instagram: @DanielleLaporte

Facebook: Danielle LaPorte