“Few among us drift towards joy.”
Nicole Zasowski
I recently sat down with Nicole Zasowski to talk about her latest book: What If It’s Wonderful: Release Your Fears, Choose Joy, and Find the Courage to Celebrate. When I read the title of her latest book all I could think was “Yes! I need this book!” And then…she joined me on the podcast and we got to talk all about it!
This is one of those conversations that I know many women, especially moms, can relate to! Here’s why I think you’ll relate. Any of these describe you at times?
- your joy is often accompanied by fear
- sometimes you feel like if you embrace joy it’ll be ripped from your hands
- you feel like joy and dreaming are a bad idea and not worth it wasting energy on
- you’re worried that celebration will come “with a catch”
- you’re always waiting for that next shoe to drop
Because, I definitely have experienced all of these and so did Nicole. Thankfully, Nicole graciously took her own experiences, plus her years of work as a licensed family and marriage therapist, and wrote a beautiful book all about them. She invites us into her own story and into a more joy-filled, celebration, and wonder-filled life as we shift our beliefs about these. In my conversation with Nicole I asked her what comes between us and a more joy-filled life filled with celebration and she shared these top five hesitancies that she’s discovered.
“As I entered a season with more joy and breakthrough, I realized that my joy was accompanied by fear. Fear that joy would be ripped from hands. Hope felt a bad idea. Dreaming felt like a bad idea. Worried that celebration came with a catch.”
Nicole Zasowksi on The Tried and Truth Podcast
The Top 5 Hesitancies to A Life of Celebration from a Conversation with Nicole Zasowksi:
- Always waiting for the shoe to drop. “Worry and anxiety really narrows our vision and we’re left with no imagination for how God might show up.” It becomes easy to keep our expectations low.
- We are “waiting” for a reason to celebrate. “This can be so disempowering and anxiety provoking. We enter transition like a new year, with our joy hinging on circumstances. We assume celebration is a reward and not a practice.” (we elaborate a lot more on this one on the podcast)
- We’re unsure of how to reconcile celebration with our value of humility.
- We’re all in community and not everyone is living the same season at the same time. We wonder how we can celebrate something others are struggling to celebrate?
- We’re so aware of our need for God in suffering that we grow close to God during these times. “A lot of us don’t have context for how to grow deep with God in our joys.”
I don’t know about you, but when she shared these with me, I felt like I’d experienced ALL of the above! It got me thinking about how much of my life I’ve been living in hesitancy rather than expectation of a wonder-filled God to show up.
“Practice celebration as a rhythm remembering God’s goodness in our lives instead of merely focusing on it being a reward for our own goodness.”
You can go check out our conversation on the podcast where she shares so much more good stuff, including practical tips to help you step foot into celebrating the wonder-filled life right in front of you. If you’re a book reader or audio-book listener, you’ll also want to go check the book!
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