Roads to Joy

I could have used any number of icons to illustrate the concept of sharing, of course, but this one struck my fancy. In so many senses, we’re all part of a team, aren’t we?

So if I share my joy, and that joy gets shared around with others, well well well, more joy accrues! And intriguingly enough, if people around me are experiencing joy because of my small contribution, and if that joy gets communicated back to me, I experience even more joy myself. Amazing!

So it was with the blog entry yesterday: a moment of sunshine in a landscape that’s been swept by wind and torrential rain, that caught my own delight. I shared it with the folks on facebook’s Allendale Area Notices and was rewarded with dozens and dozens, now nearly a hundred ‘likes’ and ‘loves.’ That makes me feel good, eliciting such a sentiment from people I may not even know. Just knowing that it’s out there, really, to be seen and perhaps enjoyed by anyone, elicits a tiny personal drum roll of satisfaction.

This fillip of delight has another side effect, in that it makes me want to re-double my efforts to create art that sings. My foray into artistic endeavours began with the creative, non-fiction writing that was AllendaleDiary.org and moved on to fiction and poetry. With perseverance, I hope I can create something that resonates, that elicits thoughtful musing by the reader, that conspires, in other words, to create more joy.

And more: a dear friend mentioned that my blog entry yesterday inspired a burst of creative endeavour in return. That’s wonderful, isn’t it? How humbling to be tapping into, and releasing, a creative energy that grows and grows.

Certainly these Roads to Joy musings are providing me with ample sign posts to the next steps along the way.