Month by Month Reflections for the Year of Joy.
Nine Goddesses to Nurture Nine Steps on the Path of Joy
This Year of Joy calendar gathers nine steps along the Path of Joy into nine months, composed of four ten-day weeks. The weeks invite you to explore joy through each of the four elements: earth, water, fire, and air, which can be experienced as metaphors – the fires of passion, for example, or the tears of sorrow – as well as richly concrete in themselves. The nine months, 360 days, come to an end on December 26, leaving five intercalary days before the Year for Joy begins again on January 1.
CLICK ON THE IMAGES OR TITLES below to read the full month’s reflection.
The Month for Joyful Acceptance and AcknowledgementMay 1 to June 9, 2024BECOMING PRAISEOnce upon a time, many years ago, this nine-fold path for practicing joy was “given,” first in words, and then in a magical calendar. Since that time, I have learned that these forty days provide the happiest and easiest way, not only to […]
The Month for Joyful Awareness March 22 to April 30, 2024 Inspiration for this month of Joy comes from The Recognition Sutras, Illuminating a 1,000-year-old spiritual masterpiece, by Christopher Wallis The masterpiece Wallis has translated is from Kashmir, composed by Rajanaka Ksemaraja. From the Prologue: “Reverence to the Divine, which constantly performs the Five Acts […]
The Month for Joyful BeliefsFebruary 10 to March 21, 2024 “Be Joyful though you have considered all the facts.”• Wendell Barry Three poets will guide us through this month of clarifying, understanding, and praising the possibility of believing in joy, of discovering joy, no matter what. Let us also expand the month’s practice into noticing […]
Joy in the World 2024The Month of Sourcing in JoyJanuary 1 – February 9Happy New Year I wrote the words below four years ago, and find them refreshingly appropriate, and accurate for this month of discovering and recovering sources of joy everywhere in this opening time of a new year. I’m pondering all we have […]
Celebrating the Birth and Rebirth of the Gods of JoyDecember 27-31, 2023 The Joy Calendar includes nine months, each of forty days, so that our year “ends” after 360 days, leaving five days outside of the calendar. The ancient Egyptians had something of the same accounting issue, and solved it by reserving the five ‘intercalary’ […]
The Month for Serving with Joy and Sharing JoyfullyNovember 17 to December 26, 2023 This, my life, is a moment in Worship.–Sheikh Abol-Hassan of Kharaqan Once upon a time, in a trance-like state, writing about navigating the River of Joy and its opening into an ocean of bliss (for the Month of Joyful Service […]
The Month for Joyful TransformationOctober 8 to November 16, 2023 Listen, the only way to tempt happiness into your mind is by taking it into the body first, like small wild plums. —Mary Oliver, from “The Plum Trees” This great artist of words offers us some enchanting suggestions for undertaking the deep work of this […]
The Month of Joyful RemembranceAugust 29 – October 7, 2023Today is a Gift Today is a gift perhaps the whole reason for this incarnation the day to embody and deliver random acts of kindness with no strings attached. It is a day to be present to the seen world and to the unseen source, to […]
The Month for Joyful Dedication“Keep your eye on the prize, Hold On! July 20 – August 28, 2023 The greatest gift we give each other is that we become a mirror of goodness. When we see the goodness in others, we call it forward. –Tara Brach Meet Anne Bruetsch, A Pilgrim of Love, and Exemplar […]
Joy in the WorldThe Month for Enriching a Sense of Joyful PresenceJune 10 – July 19, 2023 Why I Am HappyBy William Stafford Now has come, an easy time. I let itroll. There is a lake somewhereso blue and far nobody owns it.A wind comes by and a willow listensgracefully. I hear all this, every […]