Episode 33: The Fight for Joy

Stress. Disappointment. Comparison. Busyness. Negativity. Fear. Every day, something competes for our attention and threatens our peace.
In this episode, Stephanie and Michael explore why joy isn't something we accidentally stumble upon—it's something we intentionally cultivate and fiercely protect. Learn practical ways to guard your mindset, reclaim perspective, and experience joy regardless of your circumstances.

Mixed & Edited by Next Day Podcast

info@nextdaypodcast.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:05

Welcome to the Become Unshaken Podcast, where we journey through the hard together. We're so glad you're here. Welcome back to the Become Unshaken Podcast. My name is Stephanie Rodriguez.

SPEAKER_00 0:17

And I am Michael Rodriguez.

SPEAKER_01 0:18

And today we are bringing back a topic that we get asked about quite often, and it's all about joy. So we're going to dive into one of our favorite topics. How do you actually get to a place where you have joy regardless? And not just to achieve it, not just to say you have it, but to protect it fiercely. Have you ever noticed how easy it is to lose your joy? Not because something catastrophic happened, but because life just keeps coming. The calendar fills up, the bills arrive, the kids need something, work gets demanding, the news, it's overwhelming. Someone even maybe just disappoints you one day. A plan could just fall apart right before your eyes. And before you know it, you're functioning, but you're not really experiencing joy. Lately, I've been thinking about this idea that joy isn't lost all at once. In fact, we talked about it. It usually surrenders little by little, one worry, one distraction, one frustration at a time. And that's what we're talking about today, because if joy is one of the most valuable things we can experience, then maybe protecting it should become one of our most important responsibilities. So today, we're exploring what it takes to find joy and maybe more importantly, what it takes to keep it. So we're going to dive in. And we have explored this topic before. We've, again, received so many questions about getting to joy regardless. And I think it's because that's really what makes our conversations a bit different than the norm. Normal conversations about resilience really, I think a lot of experts out there try to teach you how to build it and how to experience a resilient mindset in your day-to-day life, which is incredibly important. It's why we try to build that muscle with you as well. But we also then promise this idea of getting to a place where you experience joy regardless of those circumstances. So we're going to dive into it just from a different angle today. And we thought we'd first tackle the question: can joy actually be stolen from us? Or do we unknowingly give it away? So what do you think, Michael? What do you think?

SPEAKER_00 2:19

You know, we we talk about one, the unshaken mindset, right? Your muscle of resilience as a choice. It's four particular values that we choose, that we have the ability to choose each and every day. Within each circumstance or each difficult situation, we have a choice. And so when we make that choice and we make it over and over and over again, and our resilience, that muscle of resilience, grows, and again, fueled by purpose, we talk about joy as a choice. You then can choose joy. When we distinguish uh happiness and joy, this is where it really starts. Happiness is circumstantial. So when we come up with these frustrating moments when we have these hopes or aspirations or goals and we don't meet them, or somehow, some way we just aren't able to achieve what it was that we set out to do, we then lose our happiness. And so one of the things that we really try and first distinguish is the difference between that happiness and joy. Again, happiness is circumstantial. If we can one separate, I think that that helps. Because what joy does is joy is more of a way of being, it's a way of observing life, right? It's almost the lens with which we see. And and we say joy doesn't remove the hardship. And joy doesn't need to wait for the hardship or the difficulty to end for us to choose it and to have it. That's happy. And so I think what we kind of one fall into the trap of is we think that they're the same, and as a result, when life inevitably pops up when somebody says or does something offensive or, you know, disappointing, or again, we don't do something or get something that we've sought out to get or do, well then that kind of leaves us shaken, and it kind of pulls back our our feeling of how we are looking at the world. And that's why we almost want to we want to separate, put on the glasses of joy, right? And and how we see life in the difficulty. And and so again, just a reminder for all the listeners, the the first place this starts is your purpose. And I think a lot of times it's if we are keeping our focus and our life kind of anchored onto that purpose, that, right, building towards that purpose, that future, that you know, for for us, right, and for me, I've been really open, it's it's the kids and it's time with the kids. So when I make difficult decisions or life doesn't give me what I want, whether it has to do with them or not, I'm able to look at that purpose and choose joy. So I I've to go to your original question, but does it leave why does it get stolen or how? I think we first and foremost kind of confuse circumstantial happiness and the perspective and view of life in the in and joy.

SPEAKER_01 5:42

Yeah. I I will just very directly say I do think that we unknowingly give it away. And it's really based on what you just what you just shared, because if you do define it correctly and you define it based on your purpose, then you can have a sense of control over that joy, right? Because unknowingly giving it away means that you're putting other things before it out of just lack of focus. And I'll explain myself here in in in a few short sentences. This idea of my joy doesn't necessarily anchor to whether or not I had a great day at work. It doesn't necessarily anchor to whether or not I slept well that night. You know, I might wake up a little bit grumpy because I didn't sleep well. But, you know, as soon as I get to pour into my family in the morning during our routine, that's where my joy is found. My joy is found in these small moments that really give me purpose and a sense of, you know, strong foundation in life because everything else that's swirling around, that's not what's in focus for me. That's not what's going to kind of fill my cup full of these joyful moments. It's part of my day, it's part of my life. And I give it my all, you know, with perspective, right? But it's not necessarily where I will anchor to finding joy in my everyday. And therefore, when I do put it out of perspective, I do or, you know, out of focus and start to change my priorities and put too much time and attention into certain things, that's when it when I'm out of balance, that's when I just unknowingly, kind of unconsciously gave it away.

SPEAKER_00 7:17

That's right. And, you know, again, what else you you talked there about perspective, right? And the anchor of purpose. If we are keeping our eyes focused on that North Star, and again, we we say you've got one or two purposes. If if you think you have more than that, you that's probably too many. You there's one or two things that, you know, that inner voice when when we take the time in silence, right, that tells us what what it is that what is our purpose on this earth, what matters to us the most, what is it that no matter what this world throws at us is going to get us putting one foot in front of the other and continuing to pursue that purpose and our joy. You said it perfectly. When when we allow the things that have nothing to do with our purpose to knock us down and to keep us shaken, and to get us beginning to consider or listen to that whisper of doubt of, you know, the goodness of our life and the goodness of this world, that is when we start to, as you say, almost give our joy away. So often in my professional career, I will let financial struggle and difficulty disappointing employees or disappointing vendors or unfair, you name it, shake how I'm feeling and where I'm going and how I'm looking at everything. And it really isn't until I refocus on my purpose and I go, wait, none of this is actually directly affecting my purpose. None of this is actually attacking my purpose. Now, when I'm busy at work, does that get in the way of spending time with the kids? Yes. Are the kids okay? Yes. And so, all right, let me keep these things in the correct perspective and the correct place in my life. I think often, yes, we give it away in that the very real, very understandable difficulties of this life. While they are hard, we are still alive, we still have our purpose, and we almost have to re-anchor to that purpose to continue to push us forward in that resilient mindset, that unshaken mindset, which again leads us to the ability to choose joy. Right. So I think the other part of that is joy doesn't just come, right? Especially in the hardship. We need to choose it, right? And that is a decision, just like working hard and just like living a disciplined life and making, you know, living for tomorrow, just like growing in the weight and and really active endurance in that patience and that that time of wait, and then choosing to fall, rise, and repeat to get up day in and day out. Again, those are all hopefully empowering realities where you can choose those four things. You can stay focused on that purpose, and then we must choose joy.

SPEAKER_01 10:31

Yeah. So what do you think, what do you think the biggest joy thieves are that you've observed in your own life, right? So so when you feel like it's it's fleeting a bit or maybe out of focus, like, or unknowingly, right? You you start to give it away a bit. What's what's causing that for you? And I I I have my own reflections, but would love to hear your thoughts first.

SPEAKER_00 10:53

Well, I started talking about it, you know, ever so briefly. But when it comes to work, I mean, work is by and large the greatest, I will say, you know, detriment or attacker of the way in which I am looking at my day-to-day life. Yeah. You know, 15 years of incredible grind, work ethic out the wazoo, learning tons of lessons, doing my absolute best. And I feel like, man, I am just, I'm doing everything I possibly can for this business to feel successful with in a way that I define success. So, number one, there's probably one problem is that I'm not looking maybe holistically at what it is. There are very certain things that I want out of this profession that have yet to come, that the that my career has yet to provide and offer. And so, you know, my expectations not being met and work in general and those difficulties are are usually, and I will say, you know, prior to now these kind of more recent health diagnoses, right? Sure, that is what constantly left me looking in the mirror and saying, what is going on here?

SPEAKER_01 12:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:07

What how good is life? Man, I sure feel like I've done enough to earn what I want to earn and to have the flexibility or the peace of mind financially. And it just doesn't matter. Something pops up that once again says, Nope, you're in trouble.

SPEAKER_01 12:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:24

And so I will say work 1 million percent. And then, you know, we talked about it more recently in the last, you know, eight, 10, 12 months. Just some of these health things popping up with age and most likely stress and genetics again have me thinking, okay, boy, I sure am doing everything that I've been told I'm supposed to do physically. I sure am caring for myself in the manner in which every doctor would say is great. And my doctors go, well, there's really not too much more that you can do. Uh, this is just sort of a reality for you. I will say that as well is another thing where I go, well, well, that doesn't seem fair. That doesn't seem right. Yeah. And so now I guess as I'm also saying both of these things out loud and kind of thinking out loud here, I think I'm giving life my expectations. And I as a rule follower and I as a do what you're supposed to do and all those things, and then to kind of say, oh boy, still not where I want to be, and oh boy, still not as healthy as I would have imagined I should be. So maybe those self-imposed expectations on life where I think I'm in control, which I say all the time, this world doesn't revolve around us, it doesn't revolve around me.

SPEAKER_01 13:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:43

And so all of a sudden, maybe it's that that still unspoken belief that, well, I'm doing everything I should and everything I can, and as a result, this should be my life and this is how it this is what I deserve. And then when those expectations and those results don't come, all of a sudden I think, well, I'm not very joyful about this, right? And it begins to maybe tint the way in which I look at my day-to-day life.

SPEAKER_01 14:09

Interesting. So so there is this idea that, you know, again, being a driver, being ambitious, you can kind of, I don't know, maybe find yourself a little out of balance, right? In terms of the weight of certain things on your mind or in your heart. And I feel like everyone deals with that. So I love that you share that because that vulnerable moment of of sharing, I think probably resonated with a lot of people, myself included, because there are days I can, I can sit here and say there are days where I try to have that perspective, right? So I I work, work hard, give it my all, and then, you know, dive back into to family, right, when the time is right. But some of those days stick with me longer than they should, right? And so we all have those moments where these things that, you know, should be in balance in our life take a bit more weight and a bit more out of us. And that's kind of a question of what are you, what are you in control of, right, versus what you influence. And I think making sure that we are always taking stock of that, auditing, right, where our time is going, where our mind is at, and if it's if it's correctly balanced. Because if it's not, then then we need to kind of reprioritize a bit.

SPEAKER_00 15:19

Yeah. And I think when it comes to choosing joy, we both have now just admitted the reality is that, man, life is hard, things come up, and it affects the way in which we see everything else. Yeah. The question then is also this. Do we stop the snowball in the direction of the negative? And, you know, how long do we allow ourselves to kind of roll downhill, right? Down that negative train? How long do we allow our minds to kind of focus and meditate on the hard and on the difficult? When we think to ourselves, man, I don't really have a reason to be real joyful. Do we stop that voice? Do we do we purposely combat it and say, no, no, no, choose joy? No, no, no. There are things in this situation that I can control. I can control my response. I can control what I tell myself, I can control how I treat other people. That might not help my issues at work. That might not fix the money problems. That might not make that person at work that's driving me nuts behave or act any differently. But I suddenly stop that negative voice, that snowball. I'm a huge fan of that analogy, right? A snowball's going downhill. You gotta stop it when it's going to the negative. That person's driving you nuts at work. Ask them how they're doing. Switch it up. Yeah. You both probably know that you can't really stand each other.

SPEAKER_01 16:51

Flip it, flip it on its head. Yeah, and and and you know what? You're regaining control in that moment.

SPEAKER_00 16:56

A million percent.

SPEAKER_01 16:57

Yeah. So my choosing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:00

You're choosing to fight for joy.

SPEAKER_01 17:02

Yeah, to show up differently. And and so my my joy thief, I'll I'll share you share vulnerably, so I'll share vulnerably as well. My joy thief would probably be overcommitment. So my lists get very, very long. And like many of us, I start my day with the list, the list just gets longer. So for me, it's so important that whenever I feel this way, I feel like things are just starting to slip and and it's just starting to kind of be too overwhelming. The list, the list goes blank. It's just at that point, it doesn't even matter. And and for me, the then a blank piece of paper is what replaces it. And at the very top, it's what matters most. It's presence here at home. That's number one. So how do I, how do I prioritize and protect that? And then I'll slowly add the things that should have only been at the top of the list, right underneath that most important one back on. And everything else can wait because it's not how long is your list and how much can you get done off of it. You know, there's no gold medal at the end of the day to say, you know, you, you, you absolutely killed yourself today, right? No one's waiting at the end of your day with that reward. It's you. It's you are the reward. It's, it's, it's how you feel and whether or not those priorities were protected. That's the reward. Because then you can, you can say, I had a successful day because my purpose was the priority. I got a lot of other things done that needed to get done. And I stayed in balance, right? Because there's always going to be another day and another list and another thing. And so, really, you have to ask yourself, who is in control of my time right now? And where I can make decisions, am I making the right ones? And where I can influence, am I doing that effectively as well? And so, so that would probably be the first check-in to see number one, are you allowing that joy thief, if you will, to have way too much power in your day and and with your time? And if so, I would, I would, I would challenge you to think a little bit differently about what's what's truly in focus. So I would also want to just follow that up with a another question that I think can take us into another really good place for this conversation. So you often say, Michael, joy regardless, right? We say that all the time. What does that actually look like, though, on a difficult day? So if we can just get into some examples, I think that might really benefit our listeners because they're probably thinking, well, they just don't know our day. They just don't know my day. So how does this relate to me?

SPEAKER_00 19:27

Yeah, I will say, you know, with with that, right? With with in no way can we put ourselves in anyone else's shoes. There are a million things that go on in people's lives. Good, bad, ugly, fair, unfair, you know, absolute trauma and travesty. It is never ending, unfortunately. That is that is a reality of life on this planet. It just is. But every single person, and I don't care, I don't care who you are, where you've come from, what you have and what you don't have, what you've experienced and what you've never experienced, what you've been blessed with and what you have not been blessed with, every single human being has gone through something. When it comes to choosing joy, regardless, I think one, what I was kind of touching on with regards to the stopping of the snowball. Listen, you know, as long as I own a business, I'm I'm trying so hard to just accept the reality that it doesn't matter how many restaurants I have, I'm always going to be, you know, one insane disaster away from losing everything. It's just a reality. It is a fact. You know, you're responsible for so much. And, you know, I unless you're, I don't know, Bezos, but even Amazon's laying off thousands of people, right? So I don't care how much money you have. You are always on the verge of losing something. On the days, and they are many, that I get bad news, hard realities to swallow and accept. You better believe that I get home from the road or I step out of that office and I find the nearest kiddo, and I literally say, What do you want to do right now? What do you want? I want to build trains, done, let's build trains. I want to throw the baseball, done, let's throw the baseball. I want to color with you, done. What are we coloring? Get us a book, get us some pictures, teach me this. That is how I stop the snowball of very difficult realities, and how I take one, you know, moment in my, you know, late afternoon, my early or late evening to say, I'm not letting this difficult situation win today. Not today. Now, I do that. Thing for 20 minutes, 35 minutes, or an hour. My problem did not go away. It didn't. Guess what? It waited for me. Yeah. And it had no problem. Right? Difficulty is incredibly patient. We must make a decision to stop that snowball, to choose joy. Again, playing with a kiddo, making Legos, that's not necessarily my joyful place, but it's theirs. And being with them brings me joy. And so again, I got to come right back to this disaster. I've got to come back and I've got to figure it out. I've got to dive into my faith and trust that somehow, some way, we are going to get through this difficult situation yet again. Those are very practical decisions that we can make. You need to call your best friend. You need to reach out to your sibling or your parent. Or you need to spend time at the gym and just escape for 30, 40 minutes. Do it. Do it. Turn that negative voice off for an hour. Choose yourself. Choose your purpose. Choose joy. And don't build up like this bank of negativity. We can listen to that voice and we can analyze and, you know, just lament over this difficult situation. And again, you know, we've got family members who are incredibly injured and not getting better and have been for months. We have friends who are losing to people close to them. I'm not saying that these things go away, and I'm not saying that they don't deserve to be mourned and lamented and felt and you know analyzed and worked through grief and difficulty, all acceptable, all necessary. But none of those people who maybe have passed away or incredibly hurt want us upset and depressed and in anxiety and all of these things that come with hardship, that's not what anyone wants. They want you to choose joy too. And I think sometimes when it comes to really big things, we almost feel guilty when we forget for a moment, when we laugh, or when we smile, or when we choose for a moment to not sit into that hard, difficult, sad place. Nobody wants that for you. No one should want that for you. And we have every right and every ability to choose to focus on something else, to anchor to that purpose, to lean in where it feels good, even for a moment. It doesn't have to transform your day. If I got a thirty thousand dollar whatever blank bill for whatever, listen, if I excruciatingly obsess about this for seven consecutive days, I don't get anywhere different. It just affects how I feel and see everything else. If I give myself some peace, I give myself some time, I force myself into moments of joy, we begin to more readily see and choose that joy in the difficulty. And I think it's that's a skill. We want to train our minds to be okay with choosing joy in the heart.

SPEAKER_01 25:50

Well, you're describing hope. That's what I feel like you're describing, because what you just said, uh a couple things resonated. You're choosing to walk away from that really difficult decision or or issue, knowing it's not going away because you walked out of your office. You're gonna have to come right back to it, and probably another one or two problems on top of it. But you're walking away intentionally to create the space for what you know will bring the kids joy and yourself joy in that moment and ensure that that purpose is prioritized and protected because the heart's never going away. And so to not focus on joy, to not choose joy, means to not have hope. And so what what kind of life are we living in that in that world? So the alternative is much scarier, not walking away from your problem momentarily, but deciding for yourself that joy can't be found because there's too much hard. Again, spoiler alert, hard's never going away. In fact, you would argue even since hard never goes away, you almost choose your hard. How hard do you want to make it? Do you want to make it where that's all you experience and hope is fleeting, or you always create space for joy and for hope in your in your day and in your life? And that I think is the mission of this book, if of this company that we've founded. We want to inspire hope and joy across the world, because if there's anything we have found in our lives and in the lives of our friends and family, the hard, it's here to stay.

SPEAKER_00 27:28

A hundred percent. That is all beautifully said. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 27:32

So let's talk about the daily habits that protect our joy. We talked about the joy thieves. Now let's talk about protecting it. Let's get into some of that really good, good stuff that people can walk away with. So, what are some habits that will help protect joy? And if we can, I do want to get into a conversation about the kiddos because, you know, they're oftentimes just so susceptible to wanting more, more tech or more time with friends or more anything, more of everything. Yeah. And and always under the impression that that will bring them joy. And we're trying to teach them good habits too. But maybe we connect dots for folks and kind of bring those answers into maybe one conversation here. But how do we how do we go into each day protecting our joy? And what are some lessons we can even teach our kids in the meantime?

SPEAKER_00 28:20

You know, when it comes to protecting, I I you need to first and foremost, and I I think another interesting question to ask the listeners and to ask ourselves. One is do we do we believe that we deserve joy? Because here's the thing. Uh if we don't believe it, if we think this life is too hard, I've made too many mistakes, I've burned too many bridges, I've made undisciplined decisions, you know, I've I've I've hurt people, whatever it is. All of a sudden you think, man, I don't know, maybe I maybe I don't deserve joy. Right? Or, you know, we just touched on a little bit, right? Somebody, we lose somebody. You know, it can be someone passes away, it can be a relationship ends, a friendship ends, a million things pop up, and we think, you know what, it's just it is impossible for me to be joyful in this. I shouldn't be. It's it's I don't I don't deserve to. I think we want to address with ourselves, each person, each of us is allowed to and made to have joy. There is joy available to everybody on this earth, and to think otherwise is to listen to lies and the world and those whispers and shouts of you know opposition to joy. It is why, you know, we talk about silence. What can we do? You take time in silence because silence is when you shut the noise of the world up. And for one moment or for ten minutes a day, we hear what I hope turns into, if it's not already, a positive voice that says you deserve joy. And we need to have joy, and let's find it and protect it and cultivate it. Let's anchor to our purpose. So first and foremost, I would say, I think we find a lot of people who say, I'm willing to do the grind. I'm I I understand you gotta work hard. I understand you gotta make smart decisions. I get it. Life is tough, and I gotta get up and get up and keep going and never stop rising. But I can't get to joy. And so my first question when I hear that is, do you believe that you deserve it? And I I think that's a pretty deep and a pretty scary question to ask, but I think more often than not, when you feel as though you just can't get there, I would ask you to dive in to yourself with the help of people that care about you within your tribe, with the help of a therapist or a pastor, or anyone else that that can really care for you and knows that you also deserve joy, to dive into why perhaps you just can't get there. I would I would ask, do you believe that you deserve to have joy in your life and on this earth? Because you do. So if there's a roadblock there, let's work through it, let's knock those walls down, and let's make that choice available. Silence, again, is a is a big one. How do you how do you protect it? You take that time in silence, you take that time, you know, it's great to start the day. It is important when the chaos of life is beginning to feel overwhelming. You talked about it beautifully a couple podcasts ago, just at work. Work is crazy, work's going nuts, and you got Zoom and meeting and another meeting and another Zoom and another conference, all these things. Man, let's encourage everybody to just take 60 seconds in silence. I I thought it was phenomenal. And I hope that's something that a lot of you professionals bring into your day-to-day. I I think it was tremendous.

SPEAKER_01 32:27

Yeah, stop the noise. You have to intentionally choose to stop the noise.

SPEAKER_00 32:31

And you do that for everybody, right? So so now you're affecting other people in the same way. And again, then you know, it just comes down to perspective. And in my opinion, gratitude.

SPEAKER_01 32:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:43

It is when we lose perspective that the difficulty of the world gets bigger than it should be. And again, I have talked about a number difficult, realistic scenarios and situations that we and our family and our friends are going through today. Yeah. And yet, I do believe that we all can still maintain some form of positive perspective on the goodness of life. We anchor in to our purpose, right? And we find ways to be grateful. Listen, I was sleeping on attic floors with no AC or heat for two years, working 91 hours a week, fighting bankruptcy, mourning the loss of my father who just died of cancer. I needed to find something, right? And what was it? Was that future purpose and love for a family where I said, I can't start a family bankrupt. I can't start a family living on this floor. Now, if I had to, I'm ready to, because guess what? I get my joy, I get this baby boy in here, and all of a sudden this floor doesn't feel so hard and it doesn't feel so cold or so hot, and all of a sudden life is all right. We got to find something. And and I challenge you again. You look at yourself and you look at your life, and listen, we we take inventory of our lives all the time, and we we measure the goodness of life based on how we feel about what we have, what we've been given in this life, and this life doesn't just give things freely. We are still awake, we are still given the power to choose joy to seek and find our purpose. We have the choice to work hard no matter what, we have the choice to be disciplined, the choice to grow in the forced weight of life, and we have the choice to fall but rise and repeat. That doesn't feel good all the time, but those are still choices that we are given. And when we make the choice in the affirmative, we get closer to joy. And when we train our minds to respond and choose differently, one, it trains us to not really work or fight for our joy, but hey, good news, gratitude, you can choose differently tomorrow. And so I think a combination of that silence and that perspective and gratitude, I think those are the foundations of how we choose joy in the heart. When we say joy regardless, regardless of circumstance, no matter what, how do you find joy? You anchor to that purpose, you sit in your silence, and you find the perspective necessary to be grateful.

SPEAKER_01 35:38

Yeah. That gratitude is a daily habit that you can not only practice but model for your kiddos. And I think that's that's the connection to make here is you know, if you give one or two gifts to to your kids, for those of you with with kids out there that you're trying to to help instill these same values, starting with gratitude. And if if they don't necessarily have habits where they start their day there, if you're not helping them through that, processing that, it could be something that you do before dinner, something you do before bed, something that helps them get into the daily practice as well as yourself of being grateful. And that does offer basically the the open door to perspective. And I think as as you said so beautifully. The other thing I'll say is how much energy we put into possessions ourselves that we model for our kiddos, because then they take that and they embrace that and they run with it too, is how many things can we accumulate, how many things are giving us those moments of happy that is basically being, you know, misinterpreted as joy. Because when we actually have meaningful experiences and build relationships and memories together, that is cultivating true joy. And that's something to model and something to give as gifts to our kids so that they can take those into the future themselves. So in closing, I think the one thing we would probably want to really stress is one of the biggest lessons we've learned is that joy isn't something we find once and then keep forever. It's actually something we choose over and over again, not because life gets easier or because circumstances suddenly improve, but because we've decided that the challenges around us, they don't dictate the condition within us. The truth is there will always be reasons to worry, always be reasons to get frustrated or become distracted, but there are also reasons to be grateful, reasons to laugh, connect, hope. And maybe that's the invitation for all of us today to stop waiting for joy to arrive and start protecting the joy that's already available to us. Because joy isn't found when life becomes perfect. It's found when we refuse to let life's imperfections take it away. And that's how we become unshaken. We're so glad you joined us today. Thanks for being with us. Please visit us on social. Visit our website if you haven't been. There's a way to contact us directly through our website. And if you don't have a copy of your book, today is the day to go to Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or Target and grab a copy for yourself. Become unshaken, joy regardless. We wish that for you every single day.

SPEAKER_00 38:08

Everybody, take care.

SPEAKER_01 38:09

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