Joy vs Happiness

Aren't they basically the same thing?

(This voiceover is an audio version of the newsletter below. As always, it’s unedited and today features me with a very stuffy nose - I’m sorry! If you like/need to listen to these posts I hope you enjoy it anyway.)

---

When I decided to focus this term’s writing loosely on the theme of living joyfully, I thought I knew what I was in for. It was going to include lots of practical ways to feel happier, to carve out tiny opportunities for delight, with some science-backed suggestions on seeking out awe and wonder thrown in. You know, joy stuff.

Turns out, I needed to go back to basics.

As in, what exactly is joy? And is it the same as happiness? Or have I just been using the words interchangeably for as long as I can remember, even though they have very different definitions? Much like I used amused and bemused interchangeably until an editor pointed out the fact that they really didn’t mean the same thing? (Yes, I died a thousand author deaths that day.)

As an elder millennial, I naturally began my rigorous research with Google, which delivered three very different answers.

1. Dictionary definitions that said joy and happiness were closely linked and quite similar:

via Cambridge Dictionary

via Collins Dictionary

2. Spiritual and religious blogs that said joy and happiness were very different:

via Christianity.com

via Compassion.com

3. Other articles that said opposite things to both of the above:

via Got Questions.com

via BetterHelp.com

So, colour me bemused.

Which one is it? Do we need happiness in order to experience joy, or does experiencing happiness stop us from benefiting from joy? Is one a gateway to the other, or is there some kind of elite emotional state here that’s available to only some of us?

After realising that there would be no simple answer to these questions because language is a slippery beast that means subjective things like “joy” and “happiness” look different to everyone, I decided to change my approach.

Instead of looking for how to best define joy and happiness, I decided to check in with my own experiences of the two. I cast my mind back over the past few months, looking for times that I’d felt happy, and times that maybe, just maybe, I’d experienced joy.

I was happy over the holidays, spending time with family and soaking in the long, slow summer days. I was happy when I finished my work for the year and closed my laptop for the last time. I was happy when a friend sent me a text message out of the blue, asking how I was.

Those things all made me very happy and I felt various levels of satisfaction, contentment, pleasure and well-being because of them.

But what about joy? When had I felt it? And how could I be sure that’s what it was?

Pretty quickly, my mind served up three memories that, somehow, I knew were different to the others.

The first, a warm day near the end of last year. It’s not long after we said goodbye to our good boy, Cash, and I’m doing my best impression of him as I lay on the grass, my face pressed into the ground. I breathe deep and I can smell the dirt, I can smell the grass, I can smell the sun in everything and feel its warmth on my back. My fingers cling to the ground and I listen to the ticks and scratchings under me. I hear the birds and the distant sounds of people and cars and life. I breathe in time with the earth for a minute and am sad and delighted and so glad to be alive.

That was joy.

The second was only recently, as I watch Barbie with our daughter. It’s that scene where Barbie is shown the bittersweet beauty and pain of being alive — where life arcs from birth through childhood, adulthood to old age — and it pulls my heart open. Then our daughter rests her head on my shoulder.

That was joy.

Another one, only a couple of months ago. Driving along the highway, window down, warm air tossing my hair everywhere. It’s nearly Christmas and my favourite song comes on. I turn it up and sing it at the top of my lungs. Every word feels right, every lyric makes me feel not alone, and my voice catches on the same line in the chorus, over and over. I’m filled with a tingling sense of what’s possible.

That was joy too.

I didn’t really understand how I knew that some of these experiences were happiness, while others were joy, but instinctively, I did. Why?

Image via Warner Bros

There’s no point looking for a singular, concrete, objective definition of joy. One doesn’t exist. But for me, for now, based off my own experiences and reading a lot about what joy is and isn’t, I’ve landed here:

• Joy is deeply rooted in gratitude and connection

• Joy sticks around — it leaves a trail of luminescence in its wake that we can feel for weeks or months after

• Joy needs to be chosen, cultivated and nurtured

• Once we’ve learnt how to nurture and hold joy, we may find we can also hold grief, sadness, uncertainty or despair at the same time.

As for happiness?

I think happiness might be a training ground for joy. Not because chasing it will help us magically manifest joy, but because it teaches our brains and hearts what delight feels like.

And if joy is something that needs to be nurtured, perhaps acts of gratitude and connection, combined with moments of happiness, are one of the ways we can do that.

Beyond that, I still think joy is pretty hard to define… but I also think we know it when we feel it.

💚💚

Over the next few weeks I really want to explore the practicalities of all of this. How to make space for joy. How to add tiny glimmers of happiness to our days. How to reflect on it and see where joy might be showing up. But first, I would love to know: do you think there’s a difference between joy and happiness? Have you experienced joy recently? Are there any questions you’d like me to try and answer this term? Please feel free to share below. I’m always delighted to learn what brings other people joy.

---

I’m Currently…

Watching Parks and Rec. It’s still funny and delightful.

Back on my Morning Pages kick. It slipped for quite some time there, which is perfectly normal, but I’ve adapted my morning rhythm to include it again and it’s really helping me to empty my brain of some of the busy-work before I sit down to write every day.

One-quarter of the way through the re-re-outline of my novel. Draft #4 (which feels the like the first draft that actually makes sense) will hopefully be underway over the coming weeks.

Almost certainly overestimating what I will be able to do writing-wise while I’m recuperating post-op, but that’s okay.

Enjoying Austin Kleon’s newsletter a lot. His thoughts on creativity and his honesty on being human are a wonderful combination.

---

Okay, that’s it for another week. I hope your weekend holds pockets of joy, or that you find yourself out on the training ground of happiness.

Take good care,
Brooke xx