Joy is not an absence of tensions, worries, sadness or emotional floods; it is not only an emotional joy, but it is something profound that nothing and nobody can take away from us.

It is like the deep calm of the sea: the storm moves its surface, but in the depths there is always immobility.

This joy is a gift and a choice we have to make.

it’s a gift from God, it’s a personal choice made of personal collaboration. It’s a human fruit and fruit of the Spirit.

It is a choice that I renew every morning and something that I ask every day: Lord, give me joy today. I ask God for help and then:

I choose to accept joy and live in joy.

I choose not to set conditions: if I had, if I could, if I were

I choose to live in gratitude in all things.

I choose to taste, to appreciate the joys that life offers.

I choose to see the good and beautiful side of life, to look for the positive; to see the half glass full.

I choose to flee and leave no room for anti joy: resentment, murmuring.

 

Taken from the text: “Peace, joy and charity” – Eliana Aloisi Maino