How do we hold space for joy amid unspeakable suffering around the globe?
I often feel guilty about the privileges I have in life: the ability to go out to eat occasionally, travel, or spend lazy weekends watching movies while other people are starving, living without homes, or facing unimaginable violence.
And sometimes, in that guilt, I convince myself that I should make myself smaller. Maybe I should stop living my life in ways that bring me joy to make up for the unexplainable cosmic accident that left my life free from worry about where my next meal will come from or whether my home will be bombed overnight.
I’ve learned that minimizing myself does nothing to combat the systemic oppression and inequality of this broken world. The people in power will continue taking advantage of those they deem less valuable—often people marginalized by racism, sexism, xenophobia, and homophobia—regardless of whether I spend $15 at a new restaurant. The exploitative capitalist system will continue churning with or without my participation.
I am not advocating for living with zero regard for how personal choices may impact the global population at large. I believe people should be conscious of the environmental impact of their meat consumption and flight mileage. I believe people should reflect on where they spend their money and how the businesses they support are taking from or giving back to the community. I believe people should give time or money to mutual aid organizations that support communities in ways the system will not and cannot. What I do not believe is that depleting ourselves of joy does anything to actually help those being harmed.
This is especially true for those of us who are marginalized; society already tries to steal our joy. But resistance is fighting for a better future with our joy. As Alice Walker writes, “Hard times require furious dancing.”
To celebrate our small delights, I asked the Sojourners Cycle 42 fellows about a time of “furious dancing” when they’ve laughed or felt joy during the fellowship program. Here’s what they told me:
Trinity Williams
“After my birthday, a group of us were all sitting in the Fairmont kitchen, disposing of the tin that my Beyoncé cookie cake was housed on. There was a giant plastic lid that was really, really big, and we were trying to figure out how to get it into the recycling bin. I got the bright idea that I was gonna put it on the ground and jump on it so that it would be flat ... I jumped, smashed the lid, but also simultaneously—because I was wearing my leopard-print slippers—fell completely backwards, and my slippers flew into the air. It was such a comic fall; it was so over-exaggerated and ridiculous. But what I loved about the moment was just pure laughter in the room. I wasn’t injured at all. We just couldn’t stop laughing.”
Evana Upshaw
“I got a really good laugh at our Sojourners holiday party, but the origin of the story goes back to Thanksgiving. One of our roommates was at the grocery store and noticed that the turkeys were on sale for $5 apiece, so they got two turkeys. We used one for our little Friendsgiving meal celebration, so we had a second turkey taking up space in our freezer. Our now-former fellowship director, Pastor Kaeley, had the idea to use the extra turkey for the holiday white elephant gift exchange, because the limit for gifts was $5 ... I took it upon myself to put the turkey in a portable cooler with ice packs and then wrapped the cooler in gift wrap and put it under the tree for the holiday celebration. To my dismay, the president of Sojourners, Adam Russell Taylor, chose that gift from beneath the tree and unwrapped it. He was very surprised; everyone was very confused, but I was laughing really hard ... the whole turkey debacle was very hilarious.”
Ethan Meyers
“On the way back from [our fall retreat], we got to stop in Harpers Ferry, W. Va., which was very fun for me because I enjoy not only being outside and exploring the world around me, but also history. ... I got to learn a little bit on my own and also as part of a group with the other fellows. I thought that was a nice way to bookend and close our time [on the retreat]. That’s the sort of thing that in general I’ve enjoyed about the fellowship year is the chances we've had to do things all together. I think there’s lots of freedom built into the program, and I’ve enjoyed that.”
Marjorie Lim
“We were planning on hosting some things at the house [in December], so we dug up the Christmas tree from the basement ... and then we realized there was no Christmas tree stand. Rather than let our hard work all go to waste, we tried to innovate a way to keep it up without a stand. We ended up using the ornaments bucket and decided that we were going to weigh the tree down. At first, we tried using things like old books and other things we found around the house, like sheets, and we realized that that was not going to work. But then when all seemed lost, one of us remembered that we had bricks in the backyard. What followed was an impromptu assembly line to get the bricks, heavy as they were, into the house ...until we collected enough bricks to where we figured the tree would stand upright. And we went through all of that to find out that [the bricks] mostly supported the tree, but it still had a lean, so we relegated it to a corner in the kitchen where it wasn’t so obvious that the tree was leaning.
Still, I’m really appreciative that we took the time to keep it standing because I love looking back on that tree and the intentional effort that it took to set up. Knowing we would be celebrating the last holiday season in the fellows’ house was bittersweet, but our chaotic determination to make the best of things made it less so.”
Joe Barry
“I felt very moved by our Thanksgiving celebration, for one. I thought it was a great way to invite people we work with as well as neighbors in our community to get together and share food and time and space. And as much as Thanksgiving is a cliché in that regard, I think we did a good job just making it our own, and everyone brought something to the table, quite literally—different foods that they cherish and stories of our experiences with Thanksgiving. Everyone has different feelings on the holiday and how they treat it, so it was cool to see, ‘Oh, I like to do this,’ and ‘We celebrate it this way and we recognize it in this way.’ ... I didn’t have a chance to go home for Thanksgiving, so it was nice to have a Thanksgiving with friendly faces and good food.”
Hannah Behroozi
As for me, one of my favorite memories from this year is from the weekend it snowed. People had been talking about the amount of snow we were supposed to get the entire week prior, and there was a lot of discussion about whether the snow would actually come. Although I was told about the traditional snowball fight that takes place in Malcolm X Park, I decided in advance that I would be staying inside if it snowed, soaking up all the warmth of our new home. To my delight, we did in fact get a lot of snow, and I was able to enjoy the cozy January weekend I had hoped would arrive (though let it be known that I did do my share of shoveling). The morning we woke up to a snow-covered D.C., we had an impromptu house breakfast of chocolate chip pancakes and bacon, courtesy of Evana and Ethan. In the following days, I enjoyed lounging around the house in my wintry pajamas, watching movies, playing games, and otherwise being cozy. It was lovely to have a few days to rest and relax at home without any of the internal pressure to go out and do things in the city.
The stories above may not sound particularly defiant, but they demonstrate a resolute determination to continue being fully human at a time when people in power seek to dehumanize us and so many others.
Joy by itself is not enough to combat rising authoritarianism, the ongoing genocide in Gaza, or the continued attacks on Black and brown communities in this country. Yet cultivating joy refreshes our souls and gives us strength to continue fighting for a better world.
“Hard times require furious dancing.” —Alice Walker
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