How to get your joy back
Today’s question comes to us from Stevie Bales:
I'm currently in the longest depressive episode I've had in my entire life (roughly 17 months). I'm getting therapy, medical help, and support, but still I find what I used to love, I now loathe. So, how in the world do I get my joy back?
First of all, Stevie, I’m really sorry you’re going through it, and I’m glad you’re getting help and support. Secondly, my only qualification for giving you advice is having been there myself. So please take everything I say with a grain of salt.
With that in mind: you’re not getting your joy back in the things you used to love.
Hold on. This is actually good news.
Let me tell you a story. When I was a fat little immigrant kid I spent summers with my Grandma in Portugal. Living with her was the polar opposite of living with my parents. I felt safe there. I felt loved there. And honestly, without those summers, I don’t think I would’ve realized that there were other ways in which people could interact with one another.
My grandmother was also a great believer in making soup. Every week she’d make a giant pot of caldo verde, which is a tasty Portuguese kale soup with potatoes and whatever sausage you have on hand. She’d make it on Sunday, and it would generally last until Wednesday. As a kid brought up in violence and chaos, this kind of routine was incredibly satisfying. Knowing you could count on a thing, and that thing would always be good.
When my grandmother died I was devastated. Made even more devastating because she died over a ten year period, with her memories dying first, and finally, almost as an act of grace and kindness, her body. I missed her and I missed everything she symbolized. Love. Safety. And soup. When I thought of her I thought of soup. So I was determined to recreate that. I tried every recipe for caldo verde I could find. I searched for it in restaurants. I searched for it in other people’s homes. And, to be honest, I found some very good caldo verde, but I couldn’t appreciate them because none of them were my grandmother’s.
Eventually I made my peace with the idea that something that I used to love wasn’t coming back. And the joy that I was chasing was a memory. A memory that I needed to cherish, a memory that I could think back on, and a memory that would always be there. Locked away safely where no one could reach it. At the same time I had to make peace with the fact that, moving forward, joy would have to be found in something new.
When I say you’re not getting your joy back, I mean that you’re looking in the wrong direction. What brought you joy in the past might not be what brings you joy in the future. And looking to recreate the past holds the risk of speedrunning you right back to the present. So when you say that you now loathe what you used to love that might be your body telling you “hey, can we not do that again, please!”
Try new things. New things are scary and they demand more attention than old familiar things. The more attention we need to pay to things outside of ourselves, the less time we have to dwell on the monsters inside our heads. Starve them of attention. Learn to weld. Take a neon class. Rip up the lawn in your backyard and start a garden. Learn a new language.
Once I gave up trying to recreate my grandmother’s caldo verde, I got really good at making a spicy black bean stew. Now my daughter comes over on Fridays and sometimes she’ll text me on Thursday and ask if that’s what we’re having. So, while my grandmother’s caldo verde may be gone, the real lesson stayed behind. There will always be a place where you are loved, and safe, comforted, and fed.
It may not look like it once did. You just have to move forward to find it.
💙 The current situation in Los Angeles is devastating and heart-breaking. Alissa Walker wrote something about it that is worth your time.
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📚 Both Design Is a Job and Just Enough Research now exist in delightful shitty pulp editions. They are stupid. Yes, you should get them.
👩🍳 Here is a pretty good recipe for caldo verde.
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