341 ~ 6 Simple Tools For Daily Joy

Hello Magical Human & welcome back for Madison Mindset the Podcast 🪬

In this episode, I share a personal story of chasing milestones for happiness, then map out six simple practices that build lasting joy from within. This is the shorter version of the 45 minute talk I gave at the MIND BODY SPIRIT FESTIVAL on Friday 🙏🏼

overview:
• difference between pleasure and inner joy
• the pattern of five-minute highs and why it fades
• six practices for daily joy that compound over time
• how self-talk programs your nervous system
• gratitude as attention training for abundance
• directing attention like watering a garden
• smiling as a biological mood lever
• soften the body and lengthen the exhale
• design an environment that supports peace

If you would like to join MIND MAGIC, you can join right now by going through this link: https://calendly.com/hello-madisonmindset/mind-magic

Joy is yours

Love,

Madison M x

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome & Festival Talk Setup
• 0:34 Chasing Happiness Milestones
• 3:40 The Sandpit Realization
• 5:20 Defining Joy vs Pleasure
• 7:34 Practice 1: Rewriting Self-Talk
• 12:27 Practice 2: True Gratitude
• 13:31 Practice 3: Directing Attention
• 14:51 Practice 4: Smile on Purpose
• 16:25 Practice 5: Soften Body, Breathe
• 17:12 Practice 6: Shape Your Environment
• 19:31 Bonus Tip & Program Invite
• 20:40 How to Join & Closing

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:16

Hello Magical Human and welcome back to Madison Mindset the podcast. I'm your host, Madison. I'm a yoga teacher and a mindset and spirituality coach. I'm so passionate about guiding beautiful humans such as yourself back to peace, joy, and love. It's an honor for you to be here. Thank you. For this episode, I am going to be redoing the podcast version of the talk I gave on last Friday at the Mind Body Spirit Festival in Sydney. It was amazing, super amazing, unbelievable experience. But the talk was fun. And I thought, why not do it again for everyone on the podcast? Maybe you couldn't come, that's totally fine. Maybe you're elsewhere. It was so beautiful to meet the people who were there, and it was just wonderful. So this is going to be the podcast version of that. So if you were at the talk, you now have this talk recorded for you, which is amazing. So we're going to be going over mindset tools for daily joy. It is an interesting journey how I ended up on this path, how I ended up teaching mindset, joy, yoga, breath, meditation, how I ended up there. And a big part of the reason I ended up here, especially so early, you know, I've been doing this work for over five years. I'm only 27. So, yeah, I found it pretty early, very early. And it was literally when I was 18, I found myself with no joy. I've noticed that happiness in life was very fleeting. It was very rare. I wasn't finding consistent moments of happiness. In fact, it was very few and far between the moments where I would be happy. And before I finished school, I assumed that that was because I was in school. You know, it was, you know, I didn't enjoy school. I didn't like it. I wanted to get out in the real world. So I told myself, as soon as I finish school and I go and get a job and I start my life, I'm going to be happy. Everything's going to be good. The joy will begin from there. And of course, I finished school. I started my job and I was miserable. I was happy for about five minutes when the school gates closed for the last time. When I skipped my way into my new job, yeah, I was excited for about five minutes. And then I realized I was right back at square one. I was not happy. And then I was looking forward to the next thing. I'll be happier when I get my new car. You know, I'll be happier when I get my new car. My current car is just kind of ruining my life. So when I get a new car, then I'll be happy. Get the new car. Guess what? Happy for five minutes. And again, back to square one. And this happened so many times in my life. It happened when I had a partner or a new partner. It happened when I would go on a holiday. I'd get all excited for a holiday. All I need is a holiday. All I need is to start knitting. All I need is to take up dancing. All I need is to do this and to do that. I just need to work out more. I just need to do this and that. This went on for a long time. And when I remember this moment, I was sitting at the sand pit. I was working in childcare, is a good is a good thing to note here. I was working in childcare. So I was sitting at the sandpit monitoring the situation. And I was pondering this. And I thought, you know what? If it's not the holiday, it's not the new clothes, it's not the partner, it's not the new car or the new job or starting school or finishing school, what is it? You know, what is the thing that's going to make me happy? Because the only other thing I could possibly think of was either going into another job, which I couldn't think of anything else I wanted to do at the time, or wait till retirement. Then you can be happy. But even then, I found myself going on holidays and I still wasn't happy. You know, you still have issues, you still have things happen, you know, even though you're in another part of the world or another place, that's not your home. It still brings up a sense of frustration or agitation or whatever. So it became abundantly clear to me that I needed to do something about it. Because I remember having this thought and I was only 19, I was young. And I thought, what's the point? What's the point of living if we're just gonna sit at work for eight hours a day? If we're just gonna, you know, drag ourselves out of bed on a Monday morning, if we're gonna wait to every weekend and then every weekend's over, you know, if we're just gonna jump in between things that make us happy for five minutes, like what's the point? You know, this can't be the point. And that, of course, inspired my journey to dig a little deeper, to find out what is the meaning of life? What are we doing here? What's happening? And this is where I ran into so many things, which I'm not gonna go into in this particular episode, but I ran into so many different theories, different philosophies, different teachers, different books, different researchers. I ran into so many different things that gave me so many different ideas and really started to inspire this change within me. So, for the purpose of this episode, this talk, I want you to understand some of the key things in improving daily joy. Okay. There are six things I want to go over. There are many, but these are the ones I've found to be super effective and have been backed by science, by everything else, right? So the first, but before we get into that, we first have to understand what is joy. Okay, when I say the word joy, I'm not talking about fleeting happiness. Okay, there is a quote from Eckhart Tolle, which is quite powerful. It goes, pleasure is always derived from something outside of you, whereas joy arises from within. Okay. So when you get those moments, when you get the new car, when you get the new partner, when you have the baby, when you get a new house, when you go on a holiday, and there's that moment of happiness, that's pleasure. Yay, I got something I wanted. It lasts for a very short period of time. That is not the joy we're chasing in life. Okay, that's great. That's little moments of yay, new car, yay, partner, yay, this. And that's great. Nothing taking away from that. But have you noticed that what often ruins that moment is when you remember that it's not gonna make you feel that way forever? Right? True, genuine joy arises from within. It's found on the inside. And where are we all looking? We're all looking on the outside for joy. What's gonna make me happy? And then we put pressure on things outside of us. My job has to make me happy, my money has to make me happy, my partner has to make me happy, you know, my hobby or my passion project or my holiday has to make me happy, my pet has to make me happy. These are unrealistic expectations to put on the people and experiences outside of you. No one can make you happy. Only you can find that joy that you long for, that you want to feel. We all want to feel it. Why are we all chasing that happiness? We've all been taught that it's in money, that it's in the perfect house, the perfect bedroom setup, the perfect aesthetic. We've all been told that it's on the outside. So we're all looking for it. We're all checking these boxes in our life. Yep, married, yep, kids, yep, got this. I'm still not happy. When will I get happy? You know, and if you haven't read a book by Ajon Brahm, I've recommended this so many episodes now of lost count. Opening the door of your heart. He literally goes into people are never happy. You get all the way to the end of your life and you're still not happy. So we have to do something about this because what you've been taught about where happiness comes from and what you may be expecting out of your life may be wrong. You may be off, off track in looking for happiness. Okay, and that's gonna change today because we're gonna come to the realization that hey, happiness, genuine joy, comes from within. If I'm looking outside for something to make me happy, I'm looking in the wrong place and it will not last. And it may not go the way you want it to. Okay, so we've got to find joy from within. Okay, so let's go into these six practices. They are powerful, they are super simple, and it's something you can start using right now. The first thing that changed everything for me when it comes to daily joy is understanding how important self-talk is. The voice in your head, the way you speak about yourself or about your life, massively impacts how you feel about yourself and about your life. Every time you tell yourself, oh, geez, I'm stupid, oh geez, I'm you know, I'm I'm ugly, I'm unattractive, I'm I make mistakes all the time, I always mess up, life is so hard. Every time you do that, you are affirming that belief. You are creating that negativity within you. The more you say something, the more you think something again and again and again, you are deepening that belief inside of yourself. You are deepening it to the point where you now expect it. It's something you believe to the very core. So that's what you get. What you believe, you often get. So we have to understand, you know, people who do not believe in positivity in this world, who don't believe in love and joy, they're the most miserable people on the planet. People who believe in the good in people, in a reason to smile, in gratitude, those are the happy people, right? So it's your choice as to what kind of self-talk you're going to embody. And for me, when I was younger, I was not embodying positive self-talk. I was chasing the popular kids, trying to be like them. I was trying to be enough, I was trying to be liked, I was trying to appear a certain way, appear knowledgeable, appear beautiful, appear brave, appear whatever. It was all about what others thought of me. That was what my self-talk was about. It's so negative. Now I'm my own nurturer. I nurture myself with self-talk. I change the thoughts that I'm thinking to align with joy. What is the point of thinking, oh, I always mess up? What's the point of that? Imagine if you had a small child with you, your inner child will call them, and they made a mistake. And instead of you say telling them, hey, we all make mistakes sometimes, that's okay. Stand up, brush it off, try again, you'll get it. What do you say? Are you going to bully them like you do yourself? Are you going to call them all kinds of names? Are you going to tell them they're unworthy, that they always stuff up, that they'll never get it right? Would you do that? No, of course you wouldn't. That's what you're doing to yourself. If you wouldn't say it to a small child, don't say it to yourself. Great rule of thumb. Speak with love, speak with joy, speak with patience, speak with belief and faith. Be mindful. Your experience is gonna reflect your inner experience. And if that experience is filled with self-hatred and self-loathing and life loathing and all these negative beliefs, how is that gonna go for you? Right? You can already see where we're stealing our own joy. You've got this critic in your head. So be very mindful. The most important words to focus on with this are the words I am. I am or life is or my health is or money is or love is. Be very mindful because you are building an affirmation. I do affirmations all the time on this podcast, right? You hear them all the time. They're always beautiful, loving, positive affirmations because I know that so many of us out there, just like me, are speaking negatively, constantly in our heads. We've got to get out of that habit. So be very mindful. You are speaking and thinking your reality. Align your thoughts and your self-talk with joy, with love and peace, and you'll start to get that back. Number two, gratitude. Gratitude, I feel like is an overused word, but it is an important word. People are keeping gratitude journals, right? We're thinking about being grateful, but what does that really mean to be grateful? Because the true feeling of gratitude, the true embodiment of that, it boosts your immune system, it boosts your mood, it boosts your relationships, how you feel about yourself and about life. It is powerful. What are most people focusing on? Reasons to be miserable, reasons that life isn't going well, reasons that they don't like themselves, reasons that'll never work out. That's what they're focusing on. Reasons the world is falling apart. Can you turn your attention to reasons to be grateful? What you focus on expands. If you focus on the negativity, that's what you're going to get. It's just like an algorithm on your phone, right? Whatever you're focusing on, whatever you're searching, whatever you're watching, you get more of that. What do you want more of? Gratitude is a powerful practice. Keep it in mind always. Always focus on the light. Number three, kind of similar to what I've just said, but your attention. Where your attention goes, energy flows. You've heard this quote, right? Where your attention goes, energy flows. What you're focusing on expands. Okay, I just said this. Be mindful about what you're focusing on. What are you giving your attention to? What you're giving your attention to, you're giving your energy to, you're giving your life force to. It's like when you water seeds in a garden, right? Whatever you give the water to is going to grow. The ones you neglect are going to die. So what seeds are you watering? What are you watering in your life? Because people are out there watering negativity, watering self-loathing, watering self-doubt, watering failure. Like it's just, that's what we're doing. And then those things grow. And what does that do? Reaffirm our negative belief. So focus on where your attention is going and direct it to places of love, reasons to smile, reasons to love, peace, joy. Put your attention on those places and they will expand. Those plants will grow. And wouldn't that just be amazing? Be mindful where your attention is flowing. Number four, smile. Smile. Okay. Smiling increases your mood, it makes it brighter. And at the same time, it decreases all the stress enhancing hormones in your body. So one smile. In one moment, it can increase your mood and decrease the bad. It can increase the mood, decrease the stress. Smile more. People literally, you can see people's mouths are literally falling off their face. They haven't smiled in years. The corners of their mouth are literally just hanging down. Don't let yourself end up that way. Smile. Laugh. Find reasons to smile. Because that will not only boost your immunity, it'll boost how you feel about the world. Even if you've got no reason to smile. Smile anyway. What's that quote? Smile. And the whole world will smile with you, wherever that came from. Quote, whoever said that. Smile. See how simple this is. This is so simple. If you're not smiling, why are you going to be joyful? If I say, Do you feel joy right now? Show me what joy feels like. Would you not smile? Probably. So smile. Don't wait for all the happiness outside of you to smile. Smile now. That's the biggest point here. Don't wait for everything to make you happy. Don't wait for the world to be perfect, for your life to be perfect. Smile now. It'll make a huge difference. Number five, soften your body and breathe. Notice even as you are where you are right now, how much tension is in your shoulders. How's your breath? Is it deep or is it shallow? Is it fast? The stress in your mind will be reflected in the body. The body and the mind reflect each other. You got stress in the mind, you got stress in the body. Stress in the body, stress in the mind. They work together. So you can use that to your advantage. If you relax and take a deep breath, and maybe add on number four, smile. Suddenly things are a little bit better. Soften and breathe. Do it regularly. Do it multiple times throughout the day. And finally, number six, your environment. This is probably the biggest one, the one that might require you to observe your life and what you're doing. Is your environment and what you do on a daily basis, your daily experiences, your daily routine? Is it conducive to joy? Or is it supporting stress? Think about things such as how much time you spend watching the TV or your phone. Are you watching positive things or are you watching constant drama and even horror? Are you watching fear? Because if you're watching fear, you're planting that seed. Your brain doesn't know the difference between imagined and real, a TV screen or actually happening right in front of you. So you can't expect yourself to watch three hours of relationship drama movies and then walk into joy, genuine joy. It's not gonna happen. Right? So you observe what environment am I creating? Look at how much sunlight you get. You know, do you have the blinds closed all day in your house? Are you sleeping until lunchtime? You know, what kind of food are you eating? Because food has been linked with how you feel big time. Are you eating food that is dead or food that is alive that nourishes you? Think about that. How much sleep are you getting? What do you do before sleep? What's your space like? Is it stressful? Are there bright colours everywhere? Or is it calm? Is it nourishing? What does your day look like? Observe your routine, observe what you do, and ask yourself the question: is this supporting a joyful, calm, peaceful body and mind? Or am I bringing on more stress? Think about the music you listen to, the books you read, everything. Think about it. And I'm not saying you can't ever watch horror movies or listen to dramatic breakup songs. I'm just saying that if you're doing that all the time, you're probably watering those seeds too much. The reality is what you do affects how you feel. You've got to think about it. You've got to think about it. And some of these things involve habit breaking, right? Breaking habits is not easy, but it's worth it. So I encourage you to think about those things because they might just very well be the change that you need to experience that joy on a daily basis. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you enjoyed this episode. I hope you enjoyed this talk. This was the shorter version of the talk I did on Friday. Let me know if you enjoyed it. Let me know if you have any other tips and tricks for daily joy. Tip number seven, dance around like crazy. So much fun. Put on a high vibe song, dance. That's joyful. That is full of joy. This weekend, the mind magic program is beginning. If you would like to join live and start with me, now is the time. Okay, your state of mind will create your reality, whether it's focused on joy or negativity. In the Mind Magic program, we're looking to transform the way the mind's functioning so we can experience joy, so we can experience peace and love. If you would like to join the program, you can join right now by going through the link below. Go and check it out. Jump into the program. I would love to see you there live. If you're across the ocean and the time zones are a bit strange, do not worry. There will be replays available. It's all good. You'll have access to them for as long as they exist. So one-on-one coaching is also still available. Jump in, go and book a clarity call with me. Let's find out how I can help you. Your life is once. It is special, it is sacred, and you deserve to feel joy and peace. So if you're ready and you're like, come on, let's find some peace, let's find some joy, jump in. I'm more than happy to guide you through and to assist you in any way that I can. Both those links are below. Go down there, see what support you can grab for yourself. And let's evolve our mind. Let's create daily joy. Thank you so much for being here with me. If you enjoyed the episode, please send it to someone you love, someone you think perhaps needs some more joy. Leave me a comment or a rating or a review. I really appreciate all of them. I read them all. I appreciate it so much. Thank you for helping this podcast grow. I appreciate you, and I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day. Love