Last year with the debut of my book, Me Time Monday, one of the concepts I wrote about is a perfect theme for the New Year. It is about the new “joyconomy” and how your happiness is in your hands. In fact, happiness and joy, may be the only things we do have control over. We cannot manage the U.S. economy, global conflicts, societal tensions or personal stressors such as family caregiving, but we can create joy.
As we move from a season of joy with the holidays now in the rear view mirror, it is time to shift gears into how to invest in and build upon your own personal joyconomy for the 12 months ahead. Humans are unique in the animal world – we have the ability to plan into the future whereas most other animals are just looking for ways to survive today. It is this ability to imagine tomorrow or next week or two hours from now that give us a locus of internal control over our lives.
However, this future-shaping does not work for everyone. For the 1 in 5 Americans who suffer from anxiety, the ability to think of the future actually brings ruminating on the past, fearing an ongoing lack of control. Studies show happiness is tied to having control and empowerment in what you choose to do. When you accomplish or master things – whether it is a new cookie recipe, learning a new musical instrument or getting a diaper on correctly whether it is on your child or your parent — you have more internal locus of control in your life rather than external locus of control that drives anxiety, fear and feelings of hopelessness.
While anxiety can be a serious mental health issue needing professional intervention, for the rest of us, we owe it to ourselves to seize the day and feel empowered by the ability to create mastery over certain parts of our lives. Accomplishment and mastery spark joy. No one hands you joy, you may get pleasure from others, but joy is completely your own invention. You set the critieria for it, you can choose to seek it and when it happens, you feel joy course through your body and brain. And, even in the darkest hours and most challenging situations, there are silver linings and moments of joy that give us hope and happiness and empowerment.
From FOMO to JOMO
In my book, I write about how many people are tethered to FOMO – mostly associated with the dopamine-fueled social media activity that on average consumes 2-4 hours of your day. Social media has all the elements we need to change in life: such as how to go from URL to IRL (in real life) relationships, how to have more internal locus of control instead of giving control of our happiness (how many likes or shares did you get?) to strangers and how to avoid doomscrolling and constantly making unfavorable comparisons in your life based on other’s posts.
By decreasing social media activity and the anxiety of FOMO – you embrace JOMO (Joy of missing out) by focusing on doing things that fill your soul or bring enjoyment coupled with accomplishment (in my book I write about flow psychology which is a gateway to joy). One Instagram post said it perfectly, “Social media scrolling is the new smoking.”
One of my favorite videos is by Gary Turk, a British spoken-word artist. His masterful video “Look Up” is worth the 5-minute viewing. With 62 million views to date, Turk’s message will help set the tone for a 2024 where you invest more time and effort in your joyconomy.
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