Foreboding joy is truly one of those feelings pretty much everyone experiences yet no one realizes everyone experiences it!

It’s a sneaky emotion that can sneak up when you are feeling on cloud-9, but—luckily—there’s an easy way to shift when you begin to feel a sense of foreboding joy.

Keep reading to learn about this emotion and what to do when you catch yourself feeling it!

What’s Foreboding Joy?

Foreboding joy is a feeling that I had no label for for many, many, many years of my life.

But, it was definitely a feeling I was accustomed to feeling. In fact, it is a hurdle I—to this day— keep conquering in order to really step into my own joy.

So, what exactly is foreboding joy?

Well, in Brené Brown’s book, Atlas of the Heart, she works her way through a plethora of different feelings we as humans feel.

One of which is foreboding joy—Brené Brown is actually the person I first learned about foreboding joy from!

According to Brown,

“If you’re afraid to lean into good news, wonderful moments, and joy—if you find yourself waiting for the other shoe to drop—you are not alone. It’s called ‘foreboding joy’, and most of us experience it.” -Brené Brown

Have you ever felt like you were so so so happy or joyful, and then find yourself thinking “What’s going to go wrong?”. Or perhaps you find yourself not letting yourself get too happy in fear that it will ultimately lead to a disaster. Maybe you find yourself—when you are experiencing some of the high feelings of life— self-sabotaging just to avoid the bad you think will follow from feeling too good.

What Brené points to with foreboding joy is that we feel it when we lose “our tolerance for vulnerability”. She goes on to say, “We are terrified of being blindsided by pain, so we practice tragedy and trauma. But there’s a huge cost.” Like we miss actually experiencing feelings of joy.

While I can’t exactly place when I first felt this feeling in life, I can say one of the biggest drivers for why I felt foreboding joy came from watching movies.

I remember as a young kid putting together that whenever a character in a movie had the best day ever in the movie, something terrible happened immediately after. It’s taken me years and years to really break that belief system, and honestly, it’s a belief system I still find myself breaking to this day.

However— if you are like me and really feel a feeling of foreboding joy— then trust me when I say, there is freedom on the other side of foreboding joy. Foreboding joy is truly lying to you when you feel it. And by having the courage to work through foreboding joy—leads to pure actual joy.

How To Shift From Foreboding Joy

As Brené Brown says, feeling joy is vulnerable.

It’s incredibly vulnerable.

Speaking as a human who loves and has built this space all about joy, I find myself all the time trying to lean away when I feel my inner joy shining through.

However, JOY is one of the most magical feelings felt. And, like Brené says, don’t let the moments of joy pass you by just because you are afraid of something bad happening from feeling too good.

So, how do we shift away from foreboding joy and let ourselves invite true joy in?

The answer, according to Brené Brown, is a very simple one (thank goodness!).

Gratitude. Or Appreciation.

When you find yourself in a high feeling state like joy and then find yourself trying to “dress rehearse tragedy” as Brené Brown says, try to practice gratitude/appreciation instead.

“In our research we found that everyone who showed a deep capacity for joy had one thing in common: They practiced gratitude. In the midst of joy, there’s often a quiver, a shudder of vulnerability. Rather than using that as a warning sign to practice imaging the worst-case scenario, the people who lean into joy use the quiver as a reminder to practice gratitude.” -Brené Brown

One of my all-time favorite gratitude/appreciation practices comes from the book, The Magic.

You simply write “I’m so grateful/appreciative/blessed for (insert what you are appreciative of) because (insert WHY you are appreciative of that thing)!”

Repeat this 10 times total. Afterwards, read through them each and say “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” after each statement.

It may sound a bit silly, but truly practicing this is a powerful way to shift from fearing something bad will happen if you let yourself feel too happy to feeling immense appreciation for life!

The magic of this practice lies in the WHY or the BECAUSE. It forces you to really analyze why you are blessed to have that thing in your life—it takes it a step further than just listing what you appreciate.

If you want even more ways to practice gratitude/appreciation, try reading The Magic where they will take you through a lot more ways to practice gratitude in a variety of fun ways!

Have you ever felt foreboding joy pop up in your life? Share below if it resonates with you to do so.