Choosing Joy: A Stubborn, Necessary Risk
Created at: August 10, 2025
We must risk delight. We must have the stubbornness to accept our gladness. — Jack Gilbert
Joy as Moral Courage
At the outset, Jack Gilbert’s imperative to ‘risk delight’ sets a moral frame. In his poem A Brief for the Defense, collected in Refusing Heaven (2005), he argues for gladness ‘in the ruthless furnace of this world.’ Rather than frivolity, this is courage: to let oneself be moved by beauty despite grief’s certainty. Because cynicism often masquerades as wisdom, choosing gladness requires stubbornness; it means staking dignity on the belief that tenderness belongs alongside ruin. Thus, the risk is not naiveté but commitment—to the world as it truly is, which contains both devastation and radiance.
Why Joy Feels Risky
To understand why joy feels perilous, consider our minds’ asymmetry: ‘Bad is stronger than good’ (Baumeister et al., 2001) shows negative events weigh more heavily on attention and memory. Moreover, joy exposes what we love to the possibility of loss; Brené Brown calls this ‘foreboding joy’—the reflex to rehearse tragedy when things are going well (Daring Greatly, 2012). Consequently, many of us armor up with disappointment in advance. Gilbert challenges that reflex, inviting us to be undefended enough to be glad, even when the future is uncertain and the past has taught us caution.
Joy Amid Suffering: The Ethical Tension
Yet this stance raises an ethical question: is delight a betrayal of others’ pain? Gilbert anticipates the objection—‘sorrow everywhere. slaughter everywhere.’—and still insists on gladness. The point is not to look away but to refuse despair’s monopoly. Viktor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning (1946) shows prisoners pausing to admire a sunset—an act that affirmed, rather than denied, reality. Likewise, Camus’s The Myth of Sisyphus (1942) proposes defiant happiness in the face of absurdity. In this light, delight becomes a form of witness: it says that beauty persists even where the world burns, and honoring it honors life itself.
Joy as Fuel for Solidarity
Consequently, gladness is not merely private sentiment; it generates capacity. Barbara Fredrickson’s broaden-and-build theory (American Psychologist, 2001) finds that positive emotions widen perception and build durable social and cognitive resources. Communities that celebrate together think more creatively, help more readily, and endure stress longer. This is why sustainable activism pairs outrage with relish, song, and rest; otherwise people burn out. Audre Lorde’s A Burst of Light (1988) frames self-care as political survival. By accepting gladness, we cultivate the energy and imagination required to keep showing up for one another.
Practices of Stubborn Gladness
In practice, stubborn gladness is a discipline. Start with attention, because delight is largely noticing: Mary Oliver’s ‘Instructions for living a life—Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.’ (Red Bird, 2008) outline a simple method. Then, savor: name three specifics you enjoyed each day; call a friend to share one. Create rituals of celebration for small wins. Set humane boundaries on doom-scrolling. Make, don’t just consume—cook, garden, sing, write. Finally, schedule rest without apology; gladness often arrives when we are unhurried enough to receive it, and routine gentleness makes joy more likely to return.
Holding Light with Fire
Ultimately, risking delight is not a denial of the furnace but a way to carry water through it. We can hold grief in one hand and gratitude in the other, letting neither cancel the other. As Albert Camus reflected in Return to Tipasa (1952), he discovered ‘in the midst of winter, an invincible summer within me.’ Gilbert’s counsel echoes that discovery. By practicing a stubborn acceptance of gladness, we keep alive the human faculty that refuses to be extinguished—the one that, even in ashes, looks up and dares to call what is good by its name.