Joy

One of my favourite songs in recent years has been by a band called For King and Country, entitled “Joy”.

I have been privileged to attend several professional development activities over the past few weeks, focusing on quite different aspects of my role as a Business Manager, but a common theme for each has been finding the joy in all facets of life, including work.

I guess this is not surprising, given what everyone has faced globally over the past four years with COVID, rising interest rates, cost of living pressures as well as the day-to-day challenges that life throws as us when we least expect it.

So, what is joy? The Merriam Webster dictionary defines joy “as a feeling of great pleasure or happiness that comes from success, good fortune or a sense of well-being”. 

Compassion Australia takes this definition a step further to state that “joy goes beyond the limited explanation presented in a dictionary — “a feeling a great pleasure and happiness.” True joy is a limitless, life-defining, transformative reservoir waiting to be tapped into. It requires the utmost surrender and, like love, is a choice to be made.

The difference between joy and happiness lives in the mind and heart.

• Joy is a little word. Happiness is a bigger word.
• Joy is in the heart. Happiness is on the face.
• Joy is of the soul. Happiness is of the moment.
• Joy transcends. Happiness reacts.
• Joy embraces peace and contentment, waiting to be discovered.
• Joy runs deep and overflows, while happiness hugs hello.
• Joy is a practice and a behaviour. It’s deliberate and intentional. Happiness comes and goes blithely along its way.
• Joy is profound and Scriptural. “Don’t worry, rejoice.” Happiness is a balm. “Don’t worry, be happy.”
• Joy is an inner feeling. Happiness is an outward expression.
• Joy endures hardship and trials and connects with meaning and purpose.
• A person pursues happiness but chooses joy.”

So, how does one choose joy in the workplace?  In a school environment, it is perhaps easier that in some other areas of work.  Each day we are privileged to enjoy opportunity to see happy children’s faces and experience those light bulb moments when a child makes a new discovery.

Schools are complex organisations undertaking a wide variety of activities and serving a large community. As one would anticipate there are high levels of governmental regulation that needs to be understood and implemented, reports to be prepared, deadlines to be met. Some days I go home and wonder if anything was achieved at all.  Where is the joy in that?

And the answer is found in making the choice to be joyful.  This isn’t always easy – it requires a commitment to stop and reflect on what is going right and being thankful.  Starting small – “counting your blessings’ as we were taught as children. 

And remembering “why” am I doing what I am doing.  One of the questions that we often ask at Faith is “how is this working for kids”.  Finding purpose in the banality of everyday activities.  For example, when preparing a report of safety incidents for the term, recognising that by identifying that ways we can improve, that the children of our college will be safer as a result. There may be no recognition or thanks for doing this – but I can reflect and know that what I am doing makes a difference. Being grateful to work in a place where TOGETHER we are working to achieve great things for kids.

As I’ve taken some time to reflect, be grateful, and choose joy, I encourage you to do the same. When things feel overwhelming or meaningless, take a break and reconnect with your “why.” Start with small moments of gratitude and watch as your sense of joy gradually grows.

Leanne Wheeler
Business Manager