One of my favorite little practices I learned from playing and working with Turning the Wheel is to Catch Happiness.
Our lizard brains are constantly turning out attention toward danger, and this little practice is a great way to train your brain to notice, appreciate, and focus on all that things that are going well or feeling good.
Try it today. The next time something good comes into your life, whether a small things like noticing a beautiful flower or laughing at a meme to big things like getting a promotion or falling in love, pause for 30 seconds to catch the feeling. Close your eyes and literally reach into the universe to Catch Some Happiness!
I caught some Happiness today with a homemade cup of chai. The taste enlivened my taste buds. And I caught another moment of Happiness waking up to the birds singing in my cozy bed. And another waking up to another sale in my Etsy shop. There is so much to be fearful of right now that my lizard brain is occasionally in overdrive, keeping me safe and alive. But I also want to live in gratitude for all the joy I can find around, big and small.
Catching Happiness with Joy Charms
Back in 2017 I created oodles of these sweet and simple charms as a Ostara Gift for my ritual circle. Ostara is the celebration of Spring Equinox, and to honor the fertility of the season I hosted an egg hunt. The eggs were filled with these Joy Charms!
We are still in the Ostara Season until May 1st so I thought this week would be a perfect time to bring back this craft. Spring has appeared in full here in Colorado with 70 degree days, green green grass, and blooming flowers. Inspired by the stirring vitality of the world around me I was reminded of these charms.
Each charm is made from a small circle of cardstock. I have a circle punch, but the circle could easily be made by tracing a bottle cap and cutting out with scissors instead. I then curated a list of words that sparked Joy for me, words that I would feel good about gifting to my community.
I included words like Laugh, Play, Water and Shine! I then collected lots of sparkling notions to decorate the charms. Stickers, sequins, buttons, tinsel, beads, and beautiful papers made it into my pile of decorations. From there I wrote the words beautifully onto the circles and set about making them little moments of Joy.
Who knew so much happiness could come from inch and a half circles and colorful notions.
My other hope for bringing this craft back is that they make wonderful gifts. Mail has been one of the places I've been catching Happiness. Since we are all staying home, having the opportunity to connect in an analog way such as receiving letters has become a vital source to my wellbeing. And these Joy Charms are easy to make in abundance so we can all send them out to our friends, family, and loved ones. Even just picturing a friend opening an envelope filled with a few of these colorfully playful Joy Charms makes my heart warm and fuzzy!
Preparing for the Craft-a-Long
The beautiful thing about this craft is that it is fairly simple. The Joy comes from exploring the form over and over again. To prepare for the craft start by practicing Catching Happiness! Begin first by simply taking 20 seconds every time you notice you are happy to deepen into the feeling. Then if you have more time write down what made you happy in a notebook or in a note on your phone. Return to this list to begin curating your Joy words for the charms.
Second make a list of friends or family you want to connect with. Gather their names and addresses so you can easily send your Joy Charms out once they are made. I think three to five charms per person makes an abundant gift, so consider how many charms you would like to make to determine how many Joy Charm care packages you would like to send.
And if you would like to receive a Joy Charm packet from me, and support my Craft-a-Long streams on Twitch, I've added a perk to my Patreon. There are fifteen slots available. And if you are already a patron of my Patreon, first THANK YOU! and second you can increase your patronage by $3 a month to opt in for the Joy Charm Mailing. Your support makes my stream possible! I hope to continue providing weekly craft-a-longs for the foreseeable future.
Materials
The hope for these craft-a-longs is that you can begin creating without the need to order supplies or go to the store, since most of us are settled in at home. If you don't have a specific material I encourage you to think outside the box and see what else might be available to you.
Thick paper, like card stock or watercolor paper. You could also even use postcards or thicker flyers from the mail.
A circle punch, protractor, or anything round to trace like a bottle cap, a coin, a candle base. The ideal size for the circle is 1.5"
Scissors or X-acto Knife
Notions - Sequins, buttons, feathers, string, stickers, stick-on gems, magazine images
Glue or anything sticky
Pens that make you happy, gel pens, glitter glue, crayons, sharpies, the perfect mechanical pencil, whatever you like to write with.
See you Thursday! Can't wait to get crafty with you and see catch some happiness!
Live on my Twitch Stream Thursday April 9th & Friday April 10th in the Morning at 11am MTN for a this Joyful Craft-A-Long
No account is necessary to follow along, although if you want to participate in the chat or ask questions you will need to create a Twitch account. It's easy and Free.
