7- Finding Joy in Small Things: How I’m Learning to Enjoy Life More

Slowing down and finding fulfillment in presence, not performance

Returning to Myself, One Moment at a Time

Over the past month, I’ve been peeling back the layers of a life I once thought I wanted. I wrote about how I’ve questioned long-held beliefs, gently untangled myself from inherited expectations, and begun to choose what feels aligned with who I am now, not who I was supposed to be. I’ve written about unlearning the “shoulds,” facing the fear of change, setting new boundaries, and rediscovering my voice after years of trying to live up to other people’s timelines.

It has been freeing. It has also been exhausting.

Because growth, as empowering as it is, often brings its own kind of pressure. The pressure to get it right. To heal quickly. To evolve into your “true self” with clarity and confidence. And somewhere along that journey, I found myself falling into a familiar pattern—the same one I thought I had left behind. I was still trying to measure my worth by progress. Still tying my sense of peace to productivity. Still believed that joy would arrive once I had figured everything out.

And even though I had done the inner work, challenged the roles, and made bold decisions to live more authentically, I noticed that I was still striving. Just in a new costume. I was now chasing self-improvement with the same urgency I had once chased success. I was doing the work, but forgetting to live the life.

It wasn’t until I found myself burned out again, this time not from overworking but from overthinking, that I began to understand: the next step wasn’t to do more. It was to soften. To slow down. To let the small things matter.

I simply asked myself: What if the life I’m searching for is already here?
What if joy doesn’t live in the next chapter, but in this one—in the pauses, the details, the soft spaces I’ve been too distracted to notice?

And that’s where this part of the journey begins: not in pursuit, but in presence.
Not in changing everything, but in learning to see again.

When Big Wasn’t Enough Anymore

Learning to enjoy life more hasn’t required me to change everything about the way I live—it has required me to change the way I see. It has asked me to slow down enough to notice the things I used to rush past without a second thought, to soften my gaze toward the ordinary, and to become curious about the moments that don’t ask to be captured or shared, but simply felt.

What I’m learning is that there is a quiet kind of beauty that lives in the background of our days, a kind of stillness and grace that can only be experienced when we stop performing, stop pushing, and start simply being. It doesn’t shout or demand attention—it waits patiently in the corners, in the subtle shifts of light, in the everyday routines we’ve learned to overlook.

It’s in the first sip of coffee on a quiet morning, when the world hasn’t asked anything of you yet. It’s in the walk you take without checking your phone, where your thoughts begin to soften and your body remembers its rhythm. It’s in the golden light pouring through the window in a way it didn’t the day before.

It’s in a conversation that makes you laugh from your belly. It’s in hearing a song you forgot you loved, one that takes you back to a version of yourself you hadn’t visited in a while. It’s in the smile of someone who knows you well. It’s in the breath you didn’t realize you were holding—and the relief of finally letting it go.

These are not dramatic, life-changing events. They’re not the kinds of things we plan for. But when you meet them with presence, when you stop trying to rush through them or make them more than what they are, you realize they are enough. Not because they are remarkable in the traditional sense, but because they are real. They keep you grounded in the present moment.

And sometimes, the realest things, the smallest, most unassuming ones, are what carry us through. They become a steady thread, reminding us that joy doesn’t always arrive loudly. Sometimes, it arrives quietly, wrapped in the simplicity of a moment we finally chose to notice.

Slowing Down with Intention

Slowing down isn’t always easy, especially in a world that constantly tells us we’re only as valuable as our output, that our worth is tied to how fast we move, how much we achieve, and how effortlessly we seem to handle it all. We are praised for being busy, admired for being productive, and often expected to keep going even when our bodies, minds, and hearts are quietly begging us to pause.

But what I’ve learned is that even the smallest pause, even the briefest moment of stillness, can open up space for something sacred to enter. It’s in the moments when I stop rushing from one task to the next, when I allow myself to do just one thing at a time, when I step away from distraction and simply let myself be, that I begin to feel truly connected to my life.

This shift hasn’t meant abandoning my goals or turning my back on ambition. It has meant releasing the belief that I have to arrive somewhere in order to be whole. It’s meant learning to find fulfillment in the process, to recognize that the journey itself holds meaning, not just the outcome, and finally that every process requires some time to be settled and improved.

And the more I practice moving slowly, not out of laziness, but out of presence, the more I see how much I used to miss. The details, the emotions, the subtle beauty. Slowing down, for me, has become less about doing less and more about experiencing more of what’s already around me. Fully, honestly, and without rushing to the next thing.

Final Thoughts: Life Is Happening Now

If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that life doesn’t begin once you’ve fixed everything. It doesn’t wait for your to-do list to be finished, or your goals to be met, or your life to be polished. It’s happening now—in the middle of the mess, the slowness, the ordinary.

And joy? Joy lives here too. In the overlooked corners. In the pauses between big things. In the way your chest softens when you finally exhale. In the freedom of knowing you don’t have to earn this moment—you just have to show up for it.

So if you’re tired of chasing happiness, maybe try sitting still with what you already have.
You might be surprised by how much beauty is already here, quietly waiting for you to notice.