Joy as Collective Effervescence
Two New York Times articles caught my attention this past week. Both centered on joy and the essence of what it brings to the human spirit. They inspired me to reintroduce a post I wrote on cultivating joy, which I have included here.
“Joy is part of our experience as well.” This is the reason why playwright Jocelyn Bioh says she agreed to join Shakespeare in the Park’s production of “Merry Wives.” It may be one of Shakespeare’s lesser-known comedies, and through Bioh’s lens, it will take on new dimensions with the script relocating the story to 116th in Harlem and taking on the language and culture of the immigrants who live and work there—Ghanian, Nigerian, Senegalese, and Sierra Leonian. This is what art does—it reframes and restructures something we’ve known and shows us a different perspective. Bioh felt that more than enough pain had been experienced in the Black community over the last year and it was high time to celebrate each other.
Adam Grant ends his Times article by saying that “Joy shared is joy sustained.” He brings our attention to the fact that joy is very much a group phenomenon—a collective effervescence—as conceptualized by sociologist Emile Durkheim. This term refers to the excitement generated when people experience the same heightened emotion, which then has a unifying effect. It’s an emotional contagion that can stimulate human connections from a local concert or sports event to a wave of innovation and creativity, like the Roaring Twenties. Grant aptly suggests that to cultivate this bliss we may need to create a “Declaration of Interdependence.” A beautiful notion.
Grant and Bioh both say that joy of this caliber has been, by and large, missing from our lived experiences over the past eighteen months. It’s time for us to reclaim it.
Cultivating Joy: A Leadership Essential
Joy in Purpose
I recently came across several online videos of front-line health workers at hospitals across the country letting loose and dancing in hospital hallways and rooms. It was heartwarming to see these individuals, who day in and day out work tirelessly to take care of those stricken with COVID-19, moving and grooving in masks and gowns. In spite of their stressed-filled, anxiety-ridden days, they found a way to connect with and sustain each other through an expression of dance.
The doctors and nurses filmed these quick dance segments after clocking out, after twelve-to fourteen-hour days. The dancing helped create solidarity with other health care professionals, one nurse said, to "bring joy to a really dark place right now." Another nurse told CNN: "It brings us joy. It lightens our spirits while we are testing outside in the cold and in the rain. It is a mechanism we are using to keep our spirits up.”
Unbelievably, there were several disparaging remarks under one of the YouTube videos criticizing the time they took to dance and the inappropriateness of their actions under the circumstances. Shame on anyone who would fault these heroes and heroines for finding a few moments of joy to feed their souls and give them the fortitude to push forward in this crisis.
Joy is found in meaningful engagement and expressed through gratitude. Joy is fueled by a sense of purpose that energizes motivation, which leads to transformation. When things are anything but normal, as in a pandemic, we must seek out and create moments that invigorate our purpose and strengthen our resolve. Joy manifests in many ways—as a deep sense of satisfaction, contentment, or gratification as a result of your hard work.
Be joyful / though you have considered all the facts.
—Wendell Berry
Joy in Life
In The Book of Joy, author Douglas Carlton Abrams shares conversations between the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu about joy in the face of life’s challenges. Together they explore “how to transform joy from an ephemeral state into an enduring trait, from a fleeting feeling into a lasting way of being.”
“Joy is much bigger than happiness. While happiness is often seen as dependent on external circumstances,” Archbishop Tutu says, “ Joy is not.”
He continues:
Discovering more joy does not, I’m sorry to say, save us from the inevitability of hardship and heartbreak. In fact, we may cry more easily, but we will laugh more easily, too. Perhaps we are just more alive. Yet as we discover more joy, we can face suffering in a way that ennobles rather than embitters. We have hardship without becoming hard. We have heartbreak without being broken.
—Archbishop Desmond Tutu
Sounds just like the blues, doesn’t it – acknowledging the hurt and pain, living through the loss, but triumphing, in spite of it all, even if only momentarily.
Joy in Leadership
Positive psychology founder Martin Seligman would urge us to focus on building positive emotions, character strengths, and establishing a sense of meaning in life. As self-leaders, we can determine how we approach and respond to situations. Leaders often focus on management, productivity, performance, and engagement. What if the pursuit of joy was also a part of that focus? As a leader of others, we can make a difference through the ways we encourage; build relationships based on mutual respect and trust; support meaningful contribution; and boost energy and attitude. Cultivating joy for yourself will inspire others to do the same.
Positive emotions enhance job performance
Positive emotions can be contagious throughout an organization
Simple things, like dancing, can have a big impact
Joy is our essential nature—who we are in our best state of being. Cultivate and nurture joy and ask yourself if there is joy in your leadership.
Let’s dance.
