“I define joy as a sustained sense of well-being and internal peace—a connection to what mat ters.” — Oprah Winfrey

Have you ever given thought to the emotion of joy? With the Season of Joy upon us, I am making a commitment to myself to become the observer of how, when, where and why joy arises in my experience.

This process raises some interesting questions:

•Where does joy really live, and how do we know when we are experiencing authentic joy?

•What is it that opens me to the experience commonly known as joy, and is it the same experience for you as it is for me?

•Is joy really more readily available this time of year, or is it we who are more available to joy?

•Is the source of our joy internal or external, and how can we have more of it?

This week I invited my Facebook friends to share their ideas about joy and how and when it shows up in their lives. While their comments were wonderfully diverse, there was also a very common thread running through most of them that spoke to the single most important component of joy—a sense of personal connection.

A connection to what? They referred to a universal Presence called variously God, Nature or Life, with loved ones as the conduit through which joy flows in and through their lives.

In essence, when one is feeling personally connected to life and engaged in the present moment, joy becomes a natural part of the experience.

Simply put, a connection with life brings joy.

We could say that joy is the heartthrob of the Infinite Presence pulsating in and through each of us in those moments when we feel a sense of connection to what matters, which most often centers on our relationships. Whether it is a relationship we are having with our loved ones, pets, strangers or the planet itself, what matters most, and what brings the most joy, are relationships where there is a feeling of personal connection.

Perhaps that’s because in those moments of feeling connected to the people and things that matter, we are also, knowingly or unknowingly, experiencing the greatest relationship of all—our unity with the universe itself. Joy brings with it a sense of wholeness where all sense of separation dissolves.

Where does joy live? Ultimately, joy is an inside job; it has taken up residence in our minds and hearts and is always on call, waiting to be activated and integrated in our lives and the lives of others.

We cannot give others our joy because we cannot give them that which they already have. However, we can be the stimulus that invokes joy to arise from within them. Joy is a subtle energy; it is as intangible as the air we breathe and yet as palpable as our heartbeat—as difficult to describe as love and yet as easy to feel as love.

As we move through this Season of Joy, may we remember that we don’t have to wait for special occasions to be the beneficiaries of authentic joy because there is never a moment when joy is further away than our next breath, indeed, our very next thought.

All we have to do is turn within and think a thought that connects us with who and what really matters and invite our heart to wrap itself around that image, knowing joy will ascend as surely as the morning sun.

May you know the depths of a joy so rich and meaningful that you can’t help but share it with your world this day and every day.

Dennis Merritt Jones is a local spiritual mentor, keynote speaker and author of the book “The Art of Being: 101 Ways to Practice Pur pose in Your Life.”