Opt Into Everyday Joy: The Antidote to Grief No One Talks About

Black Girl Burnout

Kelley Bonner

Health & Fitness, Mental Health

4.7 • 764 Ratings

🗓️ 18 June 2025

⏱️ 32 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In this heartfelt and healing episode of Black Girl Burnout, Kelley explores the radical power of joy in the midst of grief, burnout, and emotional overwhelm. Drawing from personal reflections and powerful psychological insights, she introduces the concept of micro-joys—small, intentional moments of delight that can help rewire our emotional landscape and bring peace, even on the hardest days. Listeners are invited to shift their perspective, claim joy as a birthright, and participate in a 7-day challenge to notice and name one micro-joy each day.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Joy is not a luxury—it’s a healing tool. Even in sorrow, we can access delight in small, meaningful ways.
Micro-joys are your emotional reset button. A good song, a bite of fruit, a moment of sunlight can restore more than you think.
Choosing joy daily helps us reclaim power. It reminds us that we’re still here, still worthy, and still allowed to feel good.

EPISODE TIMESTAMPS

00:00 – Welcome & Intention Setting
Kelley shares the emotional backdrop for this episode and why joy matters, especially now.
03:30 – What Is a Micro-Joy?
Defining micro-joys and why they’re essential tools for emotional resilience.
09:10 – Personal Stories of Everyday Joy
Kelley shares real-life examples of delight that brought light into dark moments.
15:00 – The “One Delight a Day” Challenge
Introducing a 7-day challenge to help you practice intentional joy daily.
21:20 – Final Reflection & Journal Prompts
Questions to deepen your connection to joy and anchor it in your routine.

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Are you creating your Summer of Yes?

Whether it’s sleeping in, brunching solo, or finally saying no to that thing, you deserve joy without permission or guilt.

✨ Snap a pic or video of how you're saying YES to joy, rest, and ease

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Black Girl Burnout podcast. Kelly here. And today we are talking all about micro moments of joy,
0:08.0	how to opt into the summer of yes and how by opting into a summer full of rest, full of ease,
0:14.4	full of joy, we actually can create not just a summer, but a life that is joy-centered. Now, I don't want to pretend that
0:26.5	people aren't going through it out here. Life is a lot. And that's okay. But even in hard seasons,
0:35.4	there's joy to be found. I know for so many of us, we are deep in grief
0:41.7	and doing grief work. Since I did the episode on grief, so many of you all have reached out
0:47.7	and talked about losing parents and losing children and losing jobs and losing dreams.
0:58.9	Some of us are having really huge moments of grief and loss and sadness. And some of us are having just that kind of death by a thousand cuts
1:05.1	analogy where little micro moments, racism at work or toxicity in your home life or just tension between you
1:14.9	and a partner. I don't want to pretend that life is great for everyone. But what I do want to encourage
1:22.7	you is to find joy anyway.
1:32.4	Not in opposition to what might be going on in your life,
1:38.1	not in a kind of ignoring what's going on in your life or denial, but more so from a space of you have to find joy.
1:43.5	That the only way to make it through, even the worst and hardest
1:47.3	challenges of your life, is by creating a life that has space and not just space, but centers
1:54.9	joy. And that's what this episode is going to be about, how we set the intention to create joy in our lives practically, come up with ways to do that.
2:06.8	Why small joys still matter, even if you don't have the space in your heart, in your wallet,
2:13.3	in your physical presence, in your house for it, how to still create it even in the smallest
2:20.9	ways. I also want to talk about how to create a life of delight. That's the kind of joy we
2:30.6	deserve. And my goal is for you to see how accessible it truly is. It's not waiting for you
2:36.9	to hit a million dollars, find the love of your life, have everything go perfectly, get the dream
2:41.7	job, have all the followers you want. It's not waiting for you for that. You can start having joy
	...

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