Joy

Joy is suspiciously absent from most spiritual practice, which is odd, because it's the entire point.

Somewhere along the way, seriousness got mistaken for depth.

Joy is not the reward for completing the work. It is evidence the work is working. If your practice has made you calmer but not more alive, something has gone quietly wrong. Delight is information — it tells you what you're for.

Aliveness as a legitimate measure of a good life.

Waiting to deserve joy, or treating pleasure as frivolous.

• Note one moment of genuine delight each day, however small.

• Do one thing this week purely because it's fun — no growth attached.

• At the Full Moon, read your list back.

• What did I last do just because it was fun?

• Where did I learn that joy had to be earned?

• What makes me lose track of time?

Sunstone, Citrine and Orange Calcite; Sunflower; The Sun and Three of Cups; the Waxing Gibbous phase.