Joy, No Matter What: Make 3 Simple Choices to Access Your Inner Joy

According to therapist Hobbs, you can feel joy every minute of your life-no matter whether you're taking out the garbage or driving the kids to school. It is, Hobbs believes, our own bad habits of thought and feeling that keep joy away: we obsess about negative events, we let fear and anxiety control us. But, she says, joy can be always accessible to us: not the intense joy of dancing or of seeing a gorgeous landscape, but ""the softer, subtler joy that can flood our awareness with a sense of inner peace and well-being."" Hobbs offers three steps to that joy: first, ""Say yes to what is""; then ""witness your thoughts, feelings, and reactions""; finally, ""respond differently, with kindness and compassion."" Hobb's worldview is not for everyone: some will recoil at her idea that negative events in our lives are simply the effect of ""the natural ebb and flow of the Universe."" Her argument that we should say ""yes"" to our pain and develop a relationship with it won't convince everyone. But those open to this kind of Eastern-based spiritual approach will find advice on how to deal with discouragement, loneliness, fear and the other negatives that, Hobbs says, keep us from everyday happiness.