Hello! My name is Emma. I live in Portland, Oregon, I run a web hosting company, and I write on this and several other blogs. I am woo-woo and geeky and into conscious business and marketing. For links to all my various projects, visit www.emmamccreary.com.

Why the name Joy Ninja?

Because you’ve got to cut through a lot of B.S. to be happy. And not just happy, but truly alive - joyous and free. Cultural BS, family BS, mental BS, emotional BS. You’ve got to stay sharp.

I believe that joy can change the world. Joy is an internal compass by which we can find the life we were meant to live, the work we were meant to do, and the purpose encoded in our cells.

I find the existence of joy fascinating, and what it implies about our Universe. Is there a design behind this? Is there a larger purpose to our individual passions?

In the human body, each cell has a purpose, and that purpose is encoded in its DNA. Yet our cells are probably not aware of why they exist. I suspect people are in the same position. We have inborn desires, characteristics, and our lives unfold based on this internal blueprint. But we often don’t know why. Some of us don’t care, but I do. I’ve always wanted to know what the heck is really going on here.

My explorations of spirituality, emotional healing, and creativity have led me to conclude these basic things about life on earth:

1. Our lives are purposeful. They mean something. They are part of a bigger something.
2. That bigger something is accessible. We can learn to sense its rhythms. We can learn to listen to that inner whisper that tells us what we need to do to align with that larger design and our purpose in it.
3. Listening, both inward and outward, leads to a deep peace and happiness and sense of continual expansion and unlimited joy.

So what is the larger purpose?

Honestly I don’t know. But I do have theories.

I didn’t grow up in any religion, and so I am not coming from the creation myths of a particular tradition. And I’m less interested in the past and more about possibilities for the future.

I resonate with the cosmological theories of James Gardner. From the general principle that it is incredibly improbable that the laws of physics in our Universe support life, he postulates that the “the emergence of life and intelligence is written into the laws and constants of physics at the most fundamental level…The proposition is that the whole ensemble of physical laws and constants is literally a developmental code in precisely the same sense that DNA is. It prescribes the ontogeny of what is really an organism, and it provides a plan or a blueprint for the replication of that organism. “

Now that’s what I’m talking about. That’s the kind of fractal awesomeness I love. The Universe just wants to reproduce!

But he goes on to say that what is programmed in is not finished…that our intelligence and ability to shape our world will continue to evolve. And that is what fascinates me.

I line that idea up with the Singularity, and the New Age ideas of 2012 and the Aquarian Age. There are a lot of different ideas out there about this upcoming big shift in consciousness in humanity. And I look around at the internet and blogging and how it is changing our culture and I think yes. This is it, it is happening. And within a few years, these changes in human consciousness will reach a critical mass and things will shift at a fundamental level. And we can’t know what that will look like, because we can’t yet see beyond the horizon of our current consciousness. We are headed toward some kind of Consciousness Event Horizon, and that’s awesome.

So. Back to joy. I believe joy is part of this.  Joy tells us where we are in relationship to our true purpose - to that cosmic DNA. I believe that joy has everything to do with this shift. I believe that joy can change the world. I believe joy is changing the world, as more and more people decide that joy matters.

Because each of us has a part to play in this transition. Each person matters, just like each cell in your body has a purpose. And each person’s purpose is unique, and only they can truly know what it is, because it is written in their hearts, souls, and DNA.

I am interested in pragmatic tools for how to cultivate joy, what it means to live a joyful life, and how to avoid potential pitfalls on the journey. I am also deeply interested in how to create a culture of joy, in which we encourage, support, and celebrate each other to live fully joyful lives.

Joy is not just about happiness–it’s about life force energy. It’s about letting yourself open up, letting it flow through you. It’s about surrendering to passion and connection and the vitality in your body.  It’s about the urge to create and believing you are worthy of your creations. It’s about trust and faith in the world and other people. It’s about the positive exchange of love, money, sex, and everything vital and real. It’s about expanding our capacity to experience positive feelings. Ultimately it’s about being a channel for God, for the unfolding of the comsic DNA that underlies our living Universe. And as far as joy goes, nothing feels better than that.

Note: I use “God” as shorthand for the river of life that runs through and connects everything. I acknowledge that it has a lot of various definitions and connotations attached to it and many of them are negative. Still, it has power. So when I use it, I want to be clear that I don’t mean an old bearded dude in the sky, or all the reward/punishment and morality baggage that gets attached to that image. The consciousness of the Universe is beyond the comprehension of the mind and the abilities of our language to express -”The Tao that can be named is not the eternal Tao”.

This is why I focus on experience, and on joy. We may never understand God, but we can feel a part of all that is, and that’s the point. Joy is our personal compass toward what is alive in us - and what is alive in us is also alive in the Universe, because we are the Universe.