Topix Questions 49: What Gives You Joy? & 50: What Is A Soul?

Question 49/424:  What gives you joy?

The best answer to this question is my people. I know that probably sounds codependent or basic but it’s honest. I have such a wonderful group of friends that I consider to be my true friends and have been with me for so long. Even my newest friends (the shortest friendship being 1 year) are so fully integrated into my circle and I have been so transparent with them that I feel such an undeniable connection to them. I am also an extrovert, so generally speaking I am always happier in social situations than I am when I am alone. The fact that I have a group of people that I can reach out to at any given moment and for a variety of different experiences is such a blessing. I think that’s why it’s so important to me to maintain those friendship and to be a good friend myself, because I can’t imagine my life without these people around me and helping me through all the craziness of this life.

On a more surface level, another thing that brings me joy is board games. I have recently found a few groups of people who gather on a weekly basis to play games. Not only do I find the actual playing to be fun, I also am so grateful to have met some people who are more than happy to teach the games. I don’t mind teaching, but sometimes the pressure of being the person with all of the answers gets to me and lessens the fun I could be having if I didn’t feel that pressure. So being in groups where someone else can be the teacher and have all of the answers is very much appreciated. Plus, depending on the game that’s being played, there is so much opportunity for conversation and jokes and laughter – and I do mean true belly laughter that must certainly add years to our lives. I love being around people who are willing to learn and to help one another and are just interested in the activity at hand so we can just enjoy ourselves.

Theater is another thing that brings me joy. Seeing a live performance literally feels like magic to me. I find it fascinating how people can be so talented and so able to memorize things and especially because it’s not just memorizing words, it’s also memorizing actions (or blocking as they call it). I’ve always felt that way, even when I was an elementary school student watching the high school choir performing a choreographed dance for their concert I would just watch in absolute awe and fell in love with the idea of performing. I was only able to be in three plays in highs cool – one musical and one straight play – and in one of the straight plays I was asked to be an assistant director. I knew on one level it was flattering to be asked to be an assistant director but I was simultaneously heartbroken because I just wanted to be on the stage and performing. After high school I was part of a theatrical sword fighting group, but we didn’t actually do much performing – just lots and lots of practicing. I think most people in that group were more interested in the weekly gathering than they were in performing. So after that group dissolved I stepped away from performing. It wasn’t a conscious choice, I just didn’t know what opportunities existed. I auditioned for a local community theater around 2018 but wasn’t called back. Then in 2021 I found another smaller group that helped me feel less intimidated to tryout again. I was fortunate enough to be asked to be part of a small performance where most of my lines would be delivered offstage, which I was happy to take on because I was just excited to be in those circles. There is a special energy to be found around theater people – some people might call it overwhelming – but as a person who has always been described as overwhelming I feel at peace around theater people. Plus, again, it’s just comforting to be surrounded by people who all have a similar interest. I get so much joy from being on stage and hoping that there’s someone in the audience watching and thinking they’d want to give it a try, too.

I also get joy from organizing. I often will tell friends (and acquaintances) that if they need help sorting through a room they’ve been neglecting or sorting through their closets that I am more than willing to help. I think some people assume I’m just being kind but it is actually something I find to be fun. I think that’s why I also enjoy laundry (unpopular opinion) because there’s something so satisfying about the sorting and folding of clean clothes and then the immediate satisfaction of having them put away so you can look at the room and see the floor instead of just piles and piles of clothes. Even just going through the organization section of a store brings me joy and makes me think of ideas of way I could organize my things even better. I go through my closets at least once a year to reevaluate and I’ve come up with a lot of creative solutions to hide the immense amount of stuff I’ve accumulated a two bedroom apartment. Not to say that my apartment looks like an Ikea showroom or anything, but I think most people would be surprised at how much stuff I have tucked away out of sight versus what you see out in the open.

 

Question 50/424:  What is a soul?

I think a soul in its most basic form is energy. The soul is what is leftover after we die and our bodies cease to function.

Growing up I would have considered myself a Christian, which mostly meant that I thought the afterlife was when our souls entered Heaven which was a big white room filled with light where we spent the rest of eternity praising God and Jesus. Even back then that seemed less than an ideal way for a soul to spend eternity. When I got a little bit older, I had reincarnation explained to me. The way it was explained to me – which was between two 6th graders just to be clear – was that when you died, your soul would be reincarnated as the opposite of what you were in this life. So, the example he told me was if you were a lazy person in this life, then you might be reincarnated as an ant in the next because they’re such hard workers. Something about that always appealed more to me. Even later in life someone described souls as energy, and as Julius Robert von Mayer and James Prescott Joule stated, “Energy cannot be created or destroyed; it can only be transformed from one form to another.” This kind of changed the whole game for me. The idea of an afterlife or a soul became much more complex, and this idea that energy (or the soul) could not be destroyed almost sounds comforting. It seems strange to think of an eternity where your soul continues to exist only for the purpose of praising a higher being. However, the idea that your soul just bounces around from life to life seeking out a specific purpose or a lesson that must be learned forever sounds to me like a much better alternative. I’m sure there are some people that would argue that the death of the soul and the forever sleep that follows it sounds like the more perfect ending to it all, and as far as I’m concerned, they can have that.

I’ve always been a spiritual person. My belief system has shifted away from Christianity and now I’m more likely to have a Tarot reading than I am to speak to a priest or a pastor. One of the more interesting readings – and the most jarring for me personally – was when I had a woman reading my future and she wound up asking me why I keep coming back. Obviously, this was not a question I could answer, but she went on to say that she doesn’t understand why I keep coming back, “Aren’t you tired?” she asked me, which was funny because I am in fact a perpetually tired person and a person perpetually seeking to understand myself better which is an exhausting thing. Eventually she told me that she believed this was to be my final go around, that I had done everything I needed to do and that I could rest after this life. I was taken aback by this statement, not only because it sounded so final, but also because while I have been called an old soul my entire life, I have also always felt lost and undereducated and like there was so much more I needed to do with my life. I always took some comfort in the idea that anything I failed to accomplish in this go around I could simply pick up the slack during my next life. Even if I knew that I wouldn’t necessarily be conscious of my next life, I could at least rest assured that I would get another chance.

One of my favorite genres of content is the “What If” genre. The idea that if you could go back and change things, what else would be changed? Movies like “The Butterfly Effect” or “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” and shows like “Doctor Who” have always fascinated me and left me reeling. I know that there’s no way (yet…) that we can go back on our own timelines and change things, but I like to think that if my soul was able to go into another life then when similar choices are presented to it then my soul would make different choices because it would remember the hurts that happened in the past life (lives). Maybe I’m putting too much sentiency on energy, but this is just what I hope to be true.