There's that feeling when something really good happens. Your whole body lights up. Your chest feels open instead of tight. Your shoulders drop. There's an ease to it.
And then — almost immediately — something else shows up.
This is too good to be true. There must be a catch. Things have been going well for too long.
And just like that, the joy is gone.
In this final episode of the emotions series, Alyssa makes the case that joy is one of the hardest emotions to fully experience — not because it's painful, but because for so many of us, our nervous system learned a long time ago that good things come with fine print. She opens with the story of a man at the San Antonio Zoo who told her family they'd won a free vacation. Spoiler: it was a timeshare pitch. And the exact radar that protects you from getting scammed? That same radar is what's cutting your joy short every single time.
She also gets honest about what happened the day she became a business owner — how the excitement lasted maybe a few hours before the doubt crept in, and why she never really gave herself full permission to just sit in that moment.
In this episode:
The takeaway: This week, find one small moment of joy that is just yours. Don't wait for it to show up — be proactive. Ask yourself what feels fun, what brings you actual joy, not what makes your kids happy or your house feel manageable. And if nothing comes to mind, start with laughter. Find something genuinely funny and let yourself actually laugh. Notice how your body feels after. That's joy. And you're allowed to stay there.
Chapters
00:08 What joy actually feels like — and how long you get to stay there
01:14 The timeshare at the zoo and the radar that cuts joy short
06:49 Why joy is on the difficult emotions list
08:00 Becoming a business owner — and what happened to the joy almost immediately
13:03 Where the suspicion of joy comes from
15:10 When childhood joy was told to knock it off
15:43 Pride and the humble pie that taught you to shrink your wins
18:55 What actually brings you joy? Why so many women go quiet at that question
21:38 Borrowed joy vs. joy that belongs to you
28:06 Preemptively robbing yourself — being back home before the trip is over
34:26 Secondary emotions behind joy: anxiety, guilt, hypervigilance
35:14 Your joy is not a betrayal of someone else's pain
37:35 Excitement vs. anxiety — and why your body can't always tell the difference
42:20 Your practice for this week
45:23 Joy isn't the reward for surviving. It's part of the healing.
Apply for Reclaim Your Steady — waitlist open for fall
Join Her Steady Circle Membership — first week free
Catch Alyssa on IG @heyalyssabooth
","author_name":"Alyssa Booth"}