Joy is to be found beyond the surface where happiness is found. Joy is felt deep within your spirit and can be present in the midst of hard days and good days.

The holiday season holds a hard memory for me, but I can choose joy on purpose. I can find ways to rejoice and give thanks. I have a choice in it all and so do you. There are so many things we absolutely can not change. But we can choose joy when things seem uncertain and hard.

Its all about our perspective.

How are you viewing your life from this day, this week, this year?

What words are you putting to the things you have walked through?

What posture are you taking when you talk about this year and the past few months? This week? Today?

Are you finding joy in the midst of it all?

If joy seems to be eluding you, will you try shifting a few things in how you are showing up each day?

Also let’s take a look at a few scriptures to be encouraged with truth.

* Shift your perspective from have to dos, to get to dos and set up some boundaries around your life.

* Refuse to measure your life by social media and those around you. Measure your life by the goodness of God.

* Take an inventory of the good that has happened last week and this past year. LOOK FOR THE GOOD, I promise you there has been good in your life, even when life was/may be hard.

* Find things to be grateful for and put some new words in your mouth. Uplifting words.

* Look to the Lord. Spend time walking WITH God in nature and allow him to fill you up.

* Remember how faithful God has been in the past.

* Breathe. And remember that breath. It means you are ALIVE. Allow that to make you rejoice. That’s more than enough for a joyful celebration.

* Choose to be fun, dive into fun, and be intentional to live out this life.

Encouraging Scriptures to remind us of truth

Psalms 118:24 “This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.”

Isaiah 55:12“For you shall go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall break forth into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.”

Romans 12:12 “Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer.

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 “Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”

James 1:2-3 “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.”

Romans 15:13 “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.