Joy Box

Many of my clients build Joy Boxes. They decorate and fill a container with an assortment of paper scraps. Each scrap lists a small activity, sensation, or experience that brings joy, comfort, solace, etc.

For many, food and drink are default joy sources, but like anything, too much of something is never a good thing. Training your brain to reach for other comfort sources is an integral part of changing behavior. So here is my current “Quarantine Joy Box”. Hopefully something inspires you!

• Build a worm bin

• Plant a seedling

• Root a plant cutting

• Go on a Sidewalk Safari in your neighborhood

• Make leaf rubbings

• Collect leaves and identify them (including Latin) in a “leaf collection”

• Make a succulent craft

• Grow Acres of basil from a cutting

• Regrow veggies from a grocery store

• Listen to True Crime podcasts- Casefile Podcasts

• Reread a favorite book The Awakening- Kate Chopin

• Write a Haiku

  Ghost slips under dust

  Lighting illuminates spring

  Shadows through my toes

• Play with watercolors

• Sketch yourself

Create a magazine collage

• Learn the Bachata

• Make a Dance Party playlist and host a virtual dance party

• Pick tangerines and give them away

• Knot a chunky blanket

• Play with Robinhood stocks

• Batch cook meals and freeze them

• Make LCHF muffins- Lemon Sour Cream Muffins

• Create interval workouts to share with class

• Have a video pedicure party

• Call my loved ones on video

• Revisit the Artist’s Way

• Deliver groceries to a neighbor

• Practice Italian or brush up on French

• Start a virtual short story book club with friends using the Yellow Wallpaper

• Practice the guitar

• Do a kick flip on a skateboard

• Organize and sort digital photos

• Run, run, and run again…