As July draws to a close I’m left contemplating what on earth I’m going to do for my August Social Media. I’ve been following a template challenge laid out for me by The Creative Mob through July and now it’s up to me!
There’s a lot of talk at the moment, well, even more talk than usual about the benefits of gratitude. There’s a book doing the rounds called “The Magic” by Rhonda Byrne following the success of “The Secret”. I haven’t read it, so I thought I’d design my own gratitude challenge, from my own perspective. I did one over 10 years ago and can testify to the fact that it did completely change my life, bringing me to a place of deeper self-assurance and direction.
I was sharing my ideas yesterday with a treasured colleague of mine who inquired whether I’d heard of Mudita. I had to admit that I hadn’t. But when he told me it was the Buddhist practice of delighting in the joys of others, thereby expanding and evolving it, I had to find out more.
I was introduced to a German word “schadenfreude” years ago by Oprah which is the satisfaction you feel when something bad happens to someone. Well, Mudita is the opposite. It’s about delighting in the joy that others feel.
When we practise Mudita regularly it enables us to dissolve our ego, thereby feeling connection to others, a deeper understanding and compassion for others which leads to greater levels of wisdom.
So, this month, on my social media pages, you will find my commitment to the practise of Mudita. I will be inviting people to share with me their joys and requesting that I share their happiness. I hope to connect with friends and family even more deeply, and even reach out to strangers in order to experience Mudita.
The first principal of hypnosis is “what you focus on becomes your reality”, so I’m hoping that by focussing on joy, this too will become more real for me. And I’m sure that as “a problem shared is a problem halved” that it goes without saying that “a joy shared is a joy doubled”.
In my down days, where I come across no one, I will be grateful. Grateful for family, for friends, for the place I live, for my kitchen. Research has shown gratitude to:
1. Open the door to more relationships
2. Improve physical health
3. Improve psychological health
4. Help people sleep
5. Improve self-esteem
6. Increase mental strength
So, I invite you to please join me this month. Let’s bring some Mudita and Gratitude into our lives! Please share with me your experiences.
Photo by Aman Shrivastava on Unsplash