What Brings You Joy?

What brings me joy?

For the longest time, I just didn’t know. I would be happy for a moment and then it would slip away like I never had it in the first place. I struggled with this for so long because I saw everyone else around me filled with joy. My parents took me to therapy because I was drowning in temporary happiness that faded into long bouts of depression. I stayed in my room and hid from friends and found more comfort on my own. It was lonely, but I thought it was necessary.

When I was younger and went to a Baptist church with my family, I was taught that joy and happiness are two different things. Happiness is exactly as I’ve described it - temporary, an outward expression that everyone could see. But joy is that never ending well; as long as you are content with the life you are living, that well will never dry up.

And for the longest time, I thought it was my fault that I couldn’t find that joy that everyone around me had. I was surrounded by Christians who seemed perfectly content with their lives. Week after week was the same for these people, and they thrived in their monotony. I found myself looking around and often wondering how these people didn’t crave something more than the small town life that they led - church every Sunday morning and Wednesday evening, followed by small talk about how they hated their jobs and their houses weren’t as clean as they wanted, and then going back to those jobs and houses that they hated. And it sounds like they weren’t content, but they were.

It wasn’t until my family moved to South Carolina when I was eleven that I realized how big and diverse the world actually was. I started going to school with kids who practiced different religions, kids who didn’t practice any religion, kids who also craved the same variety that I wanted. I met kids who were queer, kids who had their own opinions versus their parents’, kids who were their own people.

When I say this opened my whole world up, it really did. It flipped my idea of happiness and joy on its head. No longer was I stuck in my room, now I had comfort in my queer friends’ company and all of the things they taught me.

And then I was a queer kid. I realized that my own gender was much more pleasing to my eye than that of a man. I was thirteen, and I had just begun puberty. Again, this flipped everything on its head for me. Of course, there were other things going on at the time - my parents were getting divorced, my brother was suiting up to leave home, and I wasn’t exactly getting along with my sister.

I was young and had always trusted my parents, despite my father’s clear homophobia, so I came out. Very quickly, he thwarted my opinions down. While I cried because I had been scared to tell him, he read off a few bible verses and proved me wrong in my trust of him. I’ll repeat, I was only thirteen, and my joy was quickly taken away.

It took me years to find that joy again. Though my father disapproved of my sexuality, I found ways to let that part of myself shine in the light. I went on dates with girls, held long-term relationships, participated in the Gay-Straight-Alliance club at my school. I did anything I could to be content with who I was. My relationship with my father took a clear nose-dive the more content I was and, in all honesty, I couldn’t find it in me to let that broken relationship ruin my joy.

It wasn’t until I was eighteen - five years later - that I was courageous enough to be myself around him. Though, I’m not sure you can call it courage, because my second “coming-out” happened out of spite towards him. He had been yelling at me about something, and I told him as a way to get at him. I said something like, “If you don’t like how I act at home, you’re really not going to like how gay I am everywhere else.”

Again, my father came up with several bible verses as to why I shouldn’t feel this way. This time, though, I stood strong, looked him in the eye, and told him that I wasn’t willing to discuss it, that I wasn’t going to change who I was for his religion. After that, he left as fast as he could, as if he couldn’t stand to be around me for another second.

But for the first time in my life, I felt joy. It wasn’t temporary, it was that ever-lasting well. I went to school the next day with a pep in my step, and I smiled at everyone, and they smiled back. It was a good time in my life, despite my father’s views.

And the good time didn’t stop when the school shut down due to COVID-19. I graduated shortly after and got a new job where they were so accepting of who I was and who I chose to love. I started dating the love of my life, a very beautiful woman who I continuously give my everything to and she gives her everything right back.

And as I write this today, on the 4th of October of 2021, it’s been a week since we got married. We’re only nineteen, but as my father has always said, “when you know, you just know.” I am content with my life, I have a never ending well of joy, and I get up everyday with a smile.

Don’t be afraid to find joy, even if there are obstacles that seem impossible to overcome. Look your fear in the eye and say, “This is who I am.” Be content with you are.