In The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, Marie Kondo asks us to take a look at each of our possessions and ask the simple question, “Does this spark joy?” Her advice is that if a particular item doesn’t spark joy, then we really don’t have a good reason to keep it. This is a great way to declutter our lives, but I wanted to look a little more broadly at the concept of things in our life sparking joy. We are, at our core, beings of joy. Joy is the entire purpose of our existence. We seek out experiences that bring us joy, and we avoid experiences that take away our joy. I really like the image that sparking joy conjures up. Like striking together a piece of flint and steel, there are moments in life that strike us with beauty and warmth and light and flood us with joy. If we are not careful, however, the people and places and objects that once sparked joy in us can become dulled with over familiarity. In such cases, we owe it to ourselves to sharpen our appreciation for the things we once loved so that they can spark joy once more. One of the reasons that vacations are so full of joy is not because the place we are visiting is substantially more beautiful or impressive than our own homes, but simply that they are unfamiliar and can thus spark joy in us more easily. Every person on Earth is within a day’s journey of such wonders that people from the other side of the world would go to great expense and effort to visit and marvel at. This is the heart of the question that Alma asks to the people of Zarahemla, “And now behold, I say unto you, my brethren, if ye have experienced a change of heart, and if ye have felt to sing the song of redeeming love, I would ask, can ye feel so now?” (Alma 5:26). If we have before felt to sing the song of redeeming love, if we before have felt the hope of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ spark joy within us, can we feel so now? And if we can not, then we must plead for a mighty change of heart. We must seek to sharpen our humility and our gratitude and our awareness of all of the beauty and wonder and grace and tender mercies of the Lord pouring down upon us from every side, so that all of the most important things in life, and especially the Atonement of Jesus Christ, can once again spark joy in our hearts.
