By Joy Resor
How is your life going on the contraction/expansion scale?
Have you long felt small?
Have you felt that your voice doesn’t count?
Do you numb yourself in addictive ways?
Do you count yourself out before experimenting?
OR
Are you happy tweaking thoughts to the positive?
Do you see how you’re evolving into new aspects of who you are?
Are you touching others with kindness, patience and fun?
Are you spontaneously joyful?
Wherever you find yourself, I likely can relate.
I long lived in fearful, contracted ways, and now I live into larger aspects of my being.
Enjoy this compacted tale of my trajectory.
Little Joy.
Wiry, limber, lightweight.
Starting life with my days and nights mixed up.
An outsider.
In the Rambler’s back seat, straddling the hump in the floor. Tucking into tight spaces during rainy day games of hide and seek. Asked for my thoughts, which Dad overrides.
No voice. Contracted. Climbing trees to commune with God.
I self-soothe, nurturing my wounds by hiding in clothes too large, writing poems at my desk by the window and sitting on an elephant-sized rock in the sun, escaping the overly cold house.
How deeply I value living below the radar, being invisible.
Until…
…I’m taking a journaling class on the topic of Wild. Answering the prompts in my notebook, I have an epiphany that here I am in my 40’s, still wearing the white gloves of childhood.
Wow.
I begin to break out of boxes I inhabit.
I color outside the lines of perfection, releasing memes that no longer serve. I move past compacted, tight, and controlled, enabling me to clean out a closet of ill-fitting clothes and to increasingly lighten up.
My throat chakra opens, and Divinity visits, teaching me that separation is an illusion.
Oneness is all that exists.
Crossing bridges of understanding, I release fear to live into love. I begin believing in myself and the ways I can live beyond hiding.
Life calls me to say YES!
I ride a helicopter over Kauai, visit my son in Namibia, and lean into relationships beyond divorce, allowing me to receive the just-right partner.
These days, I enjoy each moment, ever expanding into the more where God leads.
Dear One, may you free yourself from all that holds you back, so you can sumptuously live beyond the boxes you inhabit.
Connect with me to share your story…
Bio
Joy Resor thrives in western North Carolina where she appears on podcasts, hosts Zoom meetings and writes inspiring books: a book of essays, poems, and questions to ignite your joy – Go In Joy! An Alphabetical Adventure – a book of journaling prompts – Go In Joy! Venture to Your Center – and two fully-illustrated award-winning books of topical, alphabetical rhymes – Designed to SHINE! Read Aloud Rhymes for Any Size Heart and Designed to SHINE! Read Aloud Rhymes for Any Size Heart Volume Two. Find these books on her site, ask for them at independent bookstores and find them online. https://www.joyonyourshoulders.com
Joy serves clients as their spiritual mentor and participates in a prison book and letter-writing ministry. She and her partner Michael enjoy daily walks and adventuring to new spots. When there’s not a pandemic, she’s a vendor in spiritual conventions, offering her presence of love, peace and joy with the books and inspiring Batik cotton wares she offers.