I grew up hearing that happiness was situational but that joy was not: that joy was this solid rock you stood on, and it never moved, even when everything else around you was crashing down.  I was supposed to feel a deep-seated joy, even when I wasn’t happy.  I knew this.  I tried to make it be true, tried to convince others that it was.

But for much of my life, if you were to strip away all the smiles and masks, I was resting on an uncomfortable bedrock of deep sorrow, bondage, and fear– and oceans below, barely visible, there was a flickering hope.  I smiled often– sometimes it was fake, sometimes it was real.  There were moments of joy, real instances where it flashed so bright that I couldn’t see the ugliness around me.

It’s different now.

I have what I always wanted while growing up, and it is incredible.  Even when I am feeling low, depressed, frustrated with friends or with my writing life, or even deeply saddened, I am grounded like an anchor to JOY.  I have a permanent seat inside it, and from that seat, I can experience the whole wide range of other emotions, but I don’t move from the chair.

I believe that anyone who loves Jesus Christ can have this be true.  In my early life, the problem was that I was convinced by a lie: I believed that my future was not secure in my Savior.  Obsessive-compulsive disorder robbed me of that truth.  Cognitive-behavioral therapy restored it.

What is at your core today?  Are you standing immovable on joy, or something else?  Why is that?