Are you living your richest, gutsiest, juiciest life? Do you feel all the exquisite bliss and sweetness you can imagine? If not—if you aren’t experiencing the abundance and personal freedom you crave; if you’re not vitally and deeply connected with your loved ones; if you’re unable to attract and maintain a soul-nurturing, awe-inspiring, passionate primary relationship—it can only mean one thing. You are not expressing the full truth of who you are.
Well, it’s time to change that! Juicy Joy is a streamlined path to radical authenticity and the ability to flat-out adore that precious, imperfectly perfect you. Living juicy-joyfully is not a matter of adding anything to yourself. It’s simply a matter of shedding the limitations that separate you from your true core being—the limitations that trap you in the numbness and detachment that have become distressingly “normal” in our culture. Wouldn’t it feel amazing to trust your instincts and fearlessly act on them? Isn’t it time to gain mastery over your experience of life, shed victimhood, and learn to honor the voice within you that always, unfailingly leads you to your greatest joy and highest truth?
Juicy Joy is an invitation to a bigger life—a deeper, richer, more rewarding existence. And it will launch you into an enduring love affair with your glorious, genuine self!
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Lisa McCourt’s best-selling books about unconditional love have sold more five million copies. She has taught her juicy-joyful, sometimes shocking, always delicious methods to thousands in her popular presentations and online trainings. Lisa lives in sunny South Florida with her two self-loving kids. Visit her at: www.LisaMcCourt.com.
Product Details
Paperback: 229 pages
Publisher: Hay House; Original edition (March 27, 2012)
Lisa McCourt has always been passionate about . . . passion. Her quirky addiction to personal growth, love, and un-suppressible joy has fueled a prolific writing, speaking, and teaching career that has touched the lives of millions. In just over a decade, Lisa has published over three dozen books that have been translated into 11 languages, been featured on Lifetime TV, CNN and PBS, won seven publishing awards, and sold over five and a half million copies.
Lisa's dedication to teaching the combined arts of radical authenticity and unwavering self-adoration evolved from her earlier focus on writing parenting books and children's books that helped kids grow up feeling unconditionally lovable and valuable. A frank and dynamic speaker, she has taught her juicy-joyful, sometimes shocking, always transformative methods to thousands in her popular presentations and online trainings. Lisa lives in sunny South Florida, where she shares her ever-evolving personal-growth pursuits with her two self-loving kids. Visit her at www.LisaMcCourt.com.
How Juicy Joy Was Born
I am the poster child for the popular Richard Bach quote, "We teach what we need to learn." At age 14, I read Wayne Dyer's Your Erroneous Zones, taking copious notes and copying passages from it into my journal. I'm sure the title's wordplay was lost on me, but the book's message wasn't. From that moment on, I was hooked. In college I was so fascinated with comparative religion that a maverick psychology professor allowed me to create a credited independent study program on the overlap between modern metaphysics and ancient spiritual thought.
I went on to devour every pop-psych and metaphysical book or training I could find, taking dozens of the most notable courses and working with some of the world's top coaches and gurus. What I appreciated most about all of these experiences was how remarkably similar they were, and how their principles almost always were based in the ancient truths I'd learned from my comparative religion studies. When I discovered the spirit family of Abraham, presented by Esther and Jerry Hicks, I was thrilled to have found such a comprehensive and contemporary source of these same ancient truths, and I became an avid student of Abraham's wisdom.
My life-long passion for personal development seemed to be serving me well. It was good stuff and I was a diligent pupil. Early on, I became a powerful manifester who created an adult life that was, by all objective measures, fantastic. I had a wonderful, supportive husband and two sweet, smart, kids, a beautiful home in my favorite part of the country, stellar health; time for volunteer work, plenty of friends, and a successful, dream career as a speaker and bestselling author of parenting books and children's books that were selling millions of copies.
And I was always the cheerful one. Everywhere I went, people commented on my smile, my agreeable nature. I always looked the part--to anyone who might be forming any opinion of me, anywhere. The right suburban car, the right clothes, the right social life, the great kids in the great schools, brought up by the best parenting principles.
It's not like I even consciously felt the lie. I told myself everything was perfect all the time. It had to be. Perfect, perfect, all the time. What would happen if I stopped being perfect for a second? Devastation. If I stopped being perfect, who would love me? And without perpetual love from everyone around me, how would I survive?
It sounds ridiculous, but that was the core belief I uncovered. If I stopped smiling, if I stopped pleasing, if I stopped doing the dance everyone enjoyed me doing because it made their lives easier, or lighter, or whatever--if I stopped any of that for even a second, the love-well would surely run dry and I'd shrivel up into a hard, cold, ball of ash and disintegrate into nothing. So I couldn't stop. Ever.
And if I started to feel empty and vacuous and lifeless inside, as long as I kept playing all the right parts on the outside, I'd be okay. Maybe with the right affirmations, or with the next self-help book, or the next seminar, I'd be able to patch that up without anyone ever being the wiser. And if I couldn't patch it up, at least I was always really, really good at hiding it, and as long as it stayed hidden, everything would be fine.
I woke up one day to the regrettable realization that despite all of the work I'd done, there was a substantial layer I'd yet to crack. I'd accumulated a wealth of supremely valuable knowledge, but I'd only been applying it to half of me--the half I could bear to own, the identity I'd so painstakingly crafted. I'd been unwittingly plastering layer upon layer of spiritual platitudes over a damaged and wounded core that I had never dared acknowledge, much less dive fearlessly into.
Out of that critical awareness, Juicy Joy was born. With laser-like clarity, I suddenly knew that authenticity and self-love were the keys to the kingdom. Without them, nothing else can bring you joy. With them, nothing can FAIL to bring you joy.
How Juicy Joy Was Spread
In the late 1990's, when I started getting invitations to speak at schools across the country as a bestselling author of children's books, I talked about my books and about writing. But that didn't seem fair. The whole student body was required to attend, and evening presentations were often requested for the school staff and parents. It seemed to me that all those hundreds of people couldn't possibly be interested in writing so I switched the focus of my presentations to "creativity."
Since I was such a spirituality and self-dev junkie, it didn't take long for me to start taking liberties with the word "create." I'd gloss over the requisite blah-blah-blah about creating art, literature, poetry, etc. Then I'd launch, with relish, into what I loved best--teaching these adults and kids how to "create" situations and outcomes, how to create themselves, and how to be masterful creators of their own lives.
I was afraid the national school system would catch on to my bait-and-switch tactics and stop inviting me, but the opposite happened! Word-of-mouth about my unconventional approach to teaching creativity got me more school bookings than I could handle. The evening presentation to the adults became the biggest selling-point of my visits. Eventually, the school visits led into all kinds of adult speaking gigs at national writers' conferences and spirituality conferences. I started leading workshops at libraries, spiritual centers and stores.
During my first decade as an author, I'd felt a calling to help children grow up feeling unconditionally loveable and unquestionably valuable as their true, unique selves. All my training had pointed to the irrefutable conclusion that self-love was the ticket to healthy emotional development, so I'd felt compelled to bump up the worldwide average on the number of kids who are brought up feeling unconditionally loved. After selling over five and a half million books to parents and children, that goal felt satiated and I was ready to move on to a new passion: helping millions of adults feel that same kind of intrinsic, sublime worth and self-honoring, even if it meant feeling it for the first time.
I was thrilled to have so many opportunities to share my love of New Thought material with mainstream-thinking audiences, and even more thrilled at their apparent appreciation for my unique delivery and personal perspectives on these ancient principles. I became an enthusiastic New Thought broker. My early presentations consisted mostly of me telling my audiences about the most recent fascinating modalities I'd tried and reviewing the powerful books I'd read, always through the filter of how each concept could help one become more authentic and self-loving.
It was exhilarating to realize that I was opening up magical and promising new worlds for people! My passion for this kind of "recruiting" eventually overshadowed my other professional passions and I began shaping my plethora of adult workshop materials into the book you are now reading. I knew I'd hit upon a system for never having to settle, ever, when it came to the amount of joy and richness I experienced in my life. And I couldn't think of any greater life purpose than to help others discover that same secret.
If you want to learn the easiest, most effective ways to step into your own true greatness and love the hell out of your precious self, come hang with me. I will set you up.
Autobiographical Bit from Juicy Joy - 7 Simple Steps to Your Glorious, Gutsy Self:
A garlic-infused breeze kicks up the palm fronds beside the table at my favorite neighborhood bistro. "What do you want?" Sarah asks me. Her kids and my kids--all smart, sweet and beautiful--chase one another around the plaza fountain. Sarah gets up to bring them wishing coins.
What do I want?
I want more.
I want to crash out of this invisible armor I'm trapped in--to tear away the shackles and freefall, delirious and wild. I want uninhibited, unbridled, uncontained passion. I want to plummet naked into a velvet ocean at midnight and roll in the ecstasy of the waves.
I want to peel back my layers and hold my raw wounds up to the sun for healing. I want to slice through these suffocating wrappings and grab onto core me--whoever that is--and never let her go; make her into the real me, the only me, for some to love and some not to love . . . and I want to not so painfully care who does and who doesn't.
I want to feel, taste, devour it all--no filters, no censors, no gatekeeper telling me what is rightfully mine to take and what isn't. I want rapture. I want free, primal, abandon at the top of a mountain under a full moon. I want to absorb me, embrace me, the light and the dark, the glorious and the hideous, and cherish it all and laugh at it all forever.
Sarah's back. "So what do you want?" she asks.
What do I want? "Caprese salad and a cup of pasta fagioul."
We close our menus and clink our chiantis as my daughter slides, sweaty and precious, into my lap.
* * *
I eventually did tell my friend what I wanted--after several years of clawing away at truths I had never before allowed myself to glimpse. Truths that tugged at me like a feverish itch, just under the skin, so close and ever-present, yet so ephemeral, so elusive when I chased them. This book represents my journey, but it's a guide to accessing your own Juicy Joy. A direct, streamlined path you can follow, in case you're wanting free of your armor, too. Come with me. We'll start right here and end up on that mountaintop. You in?
Does your life feel as joyful as it possibly can - to the point where you'd call it juicy? I have had stretches of my life that have been downright luscious....but this particular stretch of balancing too many things has squeezed out a lot my "juice." When my inner light was getting dim from too many late nights, sick children, and a teething baby while trying to comply with a deadline, I finally took a bath and read Juicy Joy.
Last year, I met this vibrant, warm, and completely authentic author named Lisa McCourt at a Hay House author's event. I loved her from the minute we met. Reading Lisa's new book, Juicy Joy, was an absolute treat. In the first pages of the book, she let me know that she knew me as a reader, and challenged me to actually do the exercises and meditations. Lisa called me out. And so, I had to listen and I actually followed the instructions and took the time to do the juicy movements and exercises prescribed in the book. And they were powerful.
Lisa McCourt writes in the perfect balance of seasoned expert and vulnerable human. She is such a generous and loving spirit, and I felt as though I connected with her on a deeper level because she revealed her own struggles, which made her very relatable. Her writing style is conversational, yet elegant. It's one of those books that is easy to read but also gives extremely useful and highly impactful tips and exercises.
The exercises sprinkled throughout the book are powerful and fun. I used a brand new notebook and enjoyed learning more about myself through this guided journaling process. Juicy Joy is a seven step process, starting with Emotion-Mixing, which is evaluating your life to see what's bringing you the most joy, as well as what is causing you pain, and then encourages you to really "feel" your feelings and understand the messages that you are receiving. Then in steps two through five, Lisa guides you through Filter-Fixing (exploring the way we perceive reality and experience our lives), Judgment-Flipping (examining the judgments we make of ourselves and of others), Story-Stripping (looking at the stories we've created about our lives, and where we place our attention) and then Taco Filling (bringing fabulous experiences and juicy things into our lives).
One of my favorite parables of the book is in the Story Stripping section, where Lisa encourages us to imagine a faucet with a spray hose coming from our foreheads, and we send attention out through this hose. Everything in our life is seeds, so if we focus our attention on the negative events (or seeds), we grow nice big healthy negative situations! Conversely, if we focus our attention (forehead hose) on wonderful, joyful, positive things...guess what? We get and grow more wonderful, joyful, and positive things in our lives.
The last two steps, six and seven, were the most powerful, which included Gut-Dripping and God Dipping.
As you might imagine, Gut-Dripping involves going deep within to excavate your ugly places...your hurt places...and learning more about your relationships so you be completely open and genuine with others. Lisa writes," When you love yourself fully and completely, you naturally want to share that true you with the people around you. You feel the God-presence within you. You can't help but recognize the God-presence in others." I love that!
Finally, God-Dipping brings everything together by encouraging us to take a bigger perspective of our lives and fully recognize our connection with God (Source, Universe). This ending chapter is so beautifully written and was the perfect conclusion to the soul-searching, introspection, and dreaming done in the previous steps.
If you are looking for a book to lovingly push you achieve your highest potential and remind you who you really are, then I can't recommend Juicy Joy highly enough.
We live in an age of ennui and frustrated lives. People with more powerful tools and knowledge than ever before in history somehow end up creeping along in life's slow lane on two cylinders.
Then comes Lisa McCourt and her amazing book, Juicy Joy, sounding a clear call to something more--something unimaginably better.
I was frankly surprised by just how good this book is. Not just the message, either. It is written beautifully and with great passion.
Ms. McCourt is that sunshine presence who invites us into the shadow of ourselves. With the skill of a therapist, she offers exercises which open doors into long-denied closets. She teaches us that our most authentic self is absolutely resplendent with joy, but that we must be willing to face, embrace and then release the heavy old stuff which we'd much rather ignore.
I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to live life to its juicy fullest.
"I've earned an advanced degree from the University of Me." -Lisa McCourt in Juicy Joy
What a world this would be if colleges and universities offered courses suited to this quote. To read Juicy Joy by Lisa McCourt is to take a journey into the self; witness and lay claim to the spectacular scenery contained therein, and emerge on the other side with a passion for and commitment to living a life based on radical authenticity, deep self love and blissful co-creation. Juicy Joy dives head first into the multi-faceted world of self discovery, providing readers with concrete examples and real tools to get the work done. Juicy Joy is like drinking coffee with your best friend- who has just cracked the code to living a life of joy- and is sharing her discovery with you bit by juicy bit.
The book uses seven consecutive steps to guide readers down the intimate path of self discovery. The first four- Emotion Mixing, Filter Fixing, Judgment Flipping and Story Stripping- lay the foundation for the remaining three: Taco Filling, Gut Dripping and God Dipping. If reading these phrases feels juicy, try saying them out loud. Feels good? Putting them to work feels even better. These steps, along with introspective meditation and writing exercises (Naked Writing and Juicy Feels) tailored to the individual, provide an ideal launch pad for the rockets of discovery that lie waiting in Juicy Joy.
Let's start from the beginning.
Emotion Mixing is about uncovering and accepting the wide range of human emotion. Its about learning to look through the windows of our feelings and discover the messages they contain. All emotions, positive, negative and everywhere in between can provide insight into the inner workings of the soul. Learning to respect them and show gratitude for what they teach is the first step to living a juicy joyful life.
Filter Fixing is an in depth look at perception and how it shapes experience. Its about being "deliberately selective" about what we allow into our lives. Thoughtfully illustrated using a camera lens metaphor, this step shows that we too can choose our realities by simply pointing our lenses in the most desirable direction.
Judgment Flipping begins to untangle how perception is used (in the form of judgments about the self and others) to navigate the sometimes murky waters of relationships, both with the self and others. Ms. McCourt shows with stunning clarity how all is rooted in the self and how passing judgment on others is a wake up call to self awareness. In this section things get remarkably deep, and the reader emerges with a growing sense that the best is yet to come.
Story Stripping is an exquisite analysis at the ways past, present and future converge to form the self. This section is a testament to the importance of living in the moment for the purpose of breaking free from the energetic pull of the past and moving toward a redefined (more juicy) future.
The journey continues... Taco Filling goes beyond standard visualization techniques to assist in the creation of that future. Taco Filling is about creating a "vivid imaginary world" and making that world an inner reality, fully expecting its outward manifestation.
Gut Dripping is a call to action to become as radically authentic with others as we are to ourselves. At this point the reader has done the necessary work to uncover what it is that makes him or her "tick." Now it is time to put that self knowledge to work in relationships. Gut Dripping illustrates the importance of being intimately connected to the self in order to achieve an honest, intimate connection with another.
Finally, God Dipping is about discovering and nurturing one's connection to, and place within, the all encompassing love from which all things originate.
Juicy Joy shows that to live a truly joyful life requires that we embrace, feel love toward and show gratitude for, all facets of our human experience. It is an individual call to action that illustrates the how only through extraordinary self knowledge and self love can we create a more loving collective reality. When we recognize the stamp of love on all that is contained within our physical world, we see the signature of the Divine. We feel the true essence of ourselves and one another, and we hear a life of Juicy Joy knocking at our door.
FTC Disclosure: I received this book from Hay House Publishing free of charge for review purposes. The opinions contained in the preceding review are completely my own and reflect my honest judgment of this product.
