The Difference Between Joy and Happiness (and Why it Matters)
I’m the first person to admit that I often use “joy” and “happiness” interchangeably. In my defence, in some contexts, the difference between them isn’t all that important either. However, it’s useful to be aware of it, and intentional about which emotion you’re cultivating at what time.
In the following, I hope to give you a bit of a nudge. We’ll look at the difference between the two terms, of course, but the much more important question is why it matters to be aware of it. The aforementioned nudge concerns how you can use this knowledge to get plenty of both feelings in your life.
Let’s start by looking at the difference.
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How’s happiness different from joy?
Happiness is a surge, a wave, whilst joy is the sea. That’s it, that’s the difference.
All right, I’ll explain. When you fall in love, you’re happy. If you have a windfall or get a promotion at work, land your dream job or move into your own house, you’re bound to experience happiness. One of the hallmarks of happiness is that while we’re feeling it, we can’t imagine ever feeling otherwise again.
But that’s just the thing: Happiness usually doesn’t last, or at least, it doesn’t last in the same intensity. That’s why I recommend shaking up your passions occasionally and trying something new or meeting new people through it. New inspiration can spark the happiness again. I’m sure you’ve read plenty of similar advice about relationships; but wisdom also has it that the initial high of being in love will, in a good relationship, be replaced by a deeper, more stable love.
This brings us on to joy. Joy is more of a constant state of being. It might be dimmed sometimes, when something tragic or heartbreaking happens, but once the worst of the grief is over, joy will surface again. In fact, it never went away, it was just temporarily buried under more acute emotions.
And there you have it. Whilst joy might not put you “on top of the world”, it’ll give you a deep-seated content, a feeling of being in the right place. Joy makes you grateful to be alive.
Which one should you pursue?
Here, too, there’s a short answer and a long answer. The short version is: both. The slightly longer one says that because these two emotions are so different in their character, they each have their place in life.
Happiness is exciting and makes you overflow with love and other wonderful emotions. That’s why it’s definitely worth pursuing! The only problem with happiness is that it’s so misunderstood. Romance novels and Hollywood movies in particular tend to suggest to us that happiness can be a lifelong state, setting us up for all sorts of disappointments.
It’s amazing to experience a surge in happiness, and every human deserves to experience this feeling regularly. It’s one of the reasons why I recommend pursuing passions! They tend to give us plenty of these surges, where emotions run high and we feel like hugging the whole world.
However, passions can also lead to joy, and that’s where it gets interesting.
Why you need joy
Maybe you’re not as excited as you were when you first picked up your new guitar. Sitting down and playing a few pieces, and playing them fairly well, is lovely though. You’ll feel accomplished and fulfilled.
If you pursue happiness alone, your life may begin to feel empty after a while. That way hedonism lies, which according to Merriam-Webster is “the doctrine that pleasure or happiness is the sole or chief good in life”. It sounds great, but as humans, we need a little more depth. This is where joy comes in.
Now happiness and joy are definitely related. Experiencing a lot of happiness can absolutely lead to the longer-lasting feeling of joy. In order to do that, you need to be intentional about it and not just stumble from one happiness to the next (with the inevitable bouts of unhappiness in between). This is also the reason why I talk about purpose so much.
Finding purpose
If passions lead to bouts of happiness, then purpose is the anchor that roots it all in joy. Purpose, as I’m fond of saying, gives you direction. It provides the happiness you feel about your passions with the meaning you – as a human being – crave.
Does this mean that your passion needs to be related to your purpose? No, it doesn’t. In some cases you will find that some part of your passion indeed expresses what your purpose in life is all about, but at other times, a passion can be there purely because it makes you happy. Even if that’s the case, it still feels different when there’s also purpose in your life.
Once you have found your purpose and aligned your life with it, you can intentionally choose activities that serve your purpose. At the same time, you can be intentional about doing things that bring you nothing but happiness. It’s vitally important in our lives that we don’t spend all our time doing something useful or even purposeful. If you know what you’re doing, you can – purposefully (ha!) – plan such unstructured, hedonistic times as well.
The combination of both factors in your life is what makes the magic happen. It’s what creates a life that makes you sigh in deep contentedness and gratitude, over and over again.
P.S. If you’re ready to find your unique purpose and pursue your passion(s) whilst creating time and space for yourself, too, check out The Magic of Purpose.