Word Cloud with Joy highlighted

Don’t Let Words Get In The Way of Joy

Picture of Dr. Jax Black

Dr. Jax Black

There’s a major shift in the corporate mindset these days to focus more on achieving harmony over balance. Me personally, I prefer synergy. Regardless of what word you use, I’m not certain if the corporate mindset is to be trusted to effectively implement strategies that achieve balance, harmony, or synergy until it first shows any shift in some of its underlying guiding principles and values. It’s not that a problem of them using the wrong word, it is that they’re using the wrong model of leadership.

Beyond The Words

When you don’t have the right model of leadership any construct or word that you use will always be limited in its implementation. 

Don’t get stuck behind this word or that word. When in joy it does not, it could not, matter what word you use because the guiding principles on the brighter side of leadership are so much more whole and human-centered in a way that engages leaders on the other side of the traditional frames of status quo leadership. So, breathe, be whole, and use whatever word works for you that most reflects what you need to continuously breathe and bring the best of what you have to offer. If harmony is your word, great! Use it. If another word works for you, then that’s great too. Use that. I’m certainly not going to argue over which word is better. Especially, when we all know we will choose another word in 10 or 20 years. Remember whey synergy was a great word, then it was a joke word, and now it’s making a comeback?
 
I am happy to have a much more productive conversation around authentic models of leadership that allow leaders to come into their own sense of balance, and what it means for them to be defined by what works for them than to fight over if balance is the right word or not.

Who you are in joy is more than just a word.

The Big Joy Theory Tweet

More Than Just Work-Life Balance

When most people talk about balance, they’re really just speaking to the concept of work-life balance. As we always say at Big Joy Theory the personal is professional. And in a post-COVID world, we now have all the evidence and data we need to see that we are all living and breathing human beings with families and pets running around in our homes, all day long, every day. Permission to drop the performance in the corporate mindset, that we must be, or at least act like, somebody different for work has officially been granted, whether we were ready for it or not. So, if you’re looking for that kind of balance, there it is. With that named, it is now time for us to talk about other layers and levels of balance. 

Be whole in every moment, and know that who you are is not defined by context.

The Big Joy Theory Tweet

Reflecting with amazing leaders on their journey into joy we hear leaders say new truths like “I now know that I am free. The world could be burning and I still know that I am free and in joy. It is okay to hold the simultaneity of the world being on fire and me being calm.” Now that’s balance!  Despite all of the change and transformation in the world, this is the harmony, balance, synergy, or whatever else you want to call it that all of us are seeking. Can you feel that it is this deeper sense of balance [or choose your preferred word] that conveys that these leaders are grounded in their sense of wholeness? That level of centeredness in one’s self, informed by the wisdom of what brings them joy, is the balance, harmony, synergy, etc. that they now carry inside of them as they move through the world. 

Grounded in joy, you can hold space for the tumultuous change and transformation in the world, and still be so whole that you know how to breathe through all of the madness with ease. Call it whatever you want, but keep the vision and practice of you in joy crystal clear.

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