Finding Cognitive Joy

During a college psychology class to help me understand character personalities, I came across a cool term: cognitive dissonance. I interpreted it to mean being aware that something is not quite right in your life, but you don’t know exactly what it is.

I’ve been feeling that way at the worst possible time; during this Christmas season. In the grand scheme of troubles, mine are relatively small, which led to guilt over feeling bad.

In my quest to lighten my spirit, I came up with three ways to help move from cognitive dissonance to cognitive joy:

1. Talk to someone who makes you smile.

I called my sister. We’re separated by multiple states and don’t see each other nearly enough, but we talk a lot on the phone. We laugh a lot too and that was exactly what I needed. For this blog, I uncovered a photo of my sister and me from the past. It was taken for a video her family and I created about a fake comedy club called “Laffy Fingers.” That title is a topic for a whole other blog. 🙂

2. Remember friends.

I’m blessed with two good friends at school. We call ourselves “bus buddies” because we gather to greet the high school students as they get off the buses each morning. On our last day before the Christmas break, we dressed up in matching ugly-sweaters. We even got one of the cosmetology teachers to put up my short hair for a Cindy Lou Who effect.

3. Help others through service.

This past Sunday, my church gathered to participate in Rise Against Hunger by creating meals for the less fortunate. After donning red hairnets and clear plastic gloves, we divided into five different stations: the bag fillers; the runners; the bag weighers; the sealers; and the packagers.

I joined one of the bag filling stations. We worked in teams of five: one person opened the plastic bag and dropped in a packet of powdered vitamins; another held a yellow funnel (in my group it was a patient little boy). The vitamin person held the bag under the funnel while the soy person dropped a scoop of dried soy (that was my job) into the funnel. Next, the powdered veggie person added a scoop of veggies to the bag, followed by the rice guy, who added a scoop of rice. Once all the dry ingredients filled a bag, we’d call for a “runner;” usually a young kid. We had the sweetest little boy rush to us to take our bags.

The goal was to fill 10,000 bags. Each time we filled one thousand bags, the kids would strike a gong. We got into a nice rhythm, except for the time when I got distracted and added an extra scoop of soy. My dried-veggie partner did the same. Rather than waste it, I dumped the soy/veggie combo back into my soy box. That meant for the next dozen or so bags, they got extra vegetables. 🙂

It seemed like a small thing to do, scooping soy into a plastic bag, but there were a bunch of us, all working together to fill bags. Helping the hungry, even in a small way can cheer a person up. And really. The hairnets. Who can’t help laughing at that!

Wishing everybody a joyous Christmas!