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This isn’t your average podcast—it’s a radical little book club for your ears.
Each week on Assigned Reading, feminist business coach Becky Mollenkamp invites a brilliant guest to read and unpack a feminist essay. Together, they dive into the juicy, nuanced, sometimes uncomfortable questions these texts raise about power, identity, leadership, liberation, and more.
If you’ve ever wanted to have big conversations about big ideas—but without having to get dressed, make small talk, or leave your introvert bubble—you’re in the right place.
🎧 This show is for the nerdy, the thoughtful, the socially conscious.
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📚 Think of it as a feminist book club you don’t have to RSVP for.
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Becky Mollenkamp (00:01.344)
As the radical joy coach TM, I wanted to make sure I your trademark. I don't know how there's anyone better I could be having a conversation with about an article or an essay called Joy than you Jordan. So I'm excited to do this. Thanks for being here.
Jordan Maney (00:17.595)
Thank you. I am so stoked to talk about this. This was really fun for me to read. It challenged a lot of my views and opinions on Joy. So I'm ready to dive into this.
Becky Mollenkamp (00:35.81)
Good. know, Zadie Smith, I don't know that she would be a self-proclaimed joy expert by any stretch. You know, this is an essay. It's her personal opinion. So I don't think we have to take it as gospel, but it is definitely interesting to reflect on and see where it challenges us. So that'll be fun. And also, I feel like I want to start too by saying I included this because I love Zadie Smith's work. However, she's not an explicitly like a feminist scholar and in fact has rejected the label feminist very publicly.
Jordan Maney (00:42.757)
See you.
Jordan Maney (01:02.011)
Mm. Mm-hmm.
Becky Mollenkamp (01:05.089)
and has said it's sort of, you know, a thing for white women, which I fully get. It was one of the reasons why sometimes I struggle with the label too, because I understand some of those exclusions, but we're including her because I think her work's important. And this piece in particular, speaking about joy to me, feels as part of the feminist repertoire as anything else and as important as anything else. So I'm curious, like for just a little quick dive in, what's your high level two sentence review?
Jordan Maney (01:22.619)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (01:30.554)
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (01:34.702)
before we dig in, really.
Jordan Maney (01:38.299)
Two sentences, okay. Close but no cigar.
Becky Mollenkamp (01:45.897)
One sentence. I like it.
Jordan Maney (01:47.499)
Yeah, so very close. Like I felt like she was like, I'm a cusp of getting it, but not entirely.
Becky Mollenkamp (01:56.3)
Very cool. OK, well, I'm very excited to hear why. I don't know if there was a particular, maybe we should just start there, I guess, instead of like, what's your favorite or least favorite parts. like the art of this, this essay for people who haven't read it and you don't have to read it to listen to this conversation is trying to sort of draw a distinction between pleasure and joy.
Jordan Maney (02:05.818)
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (02:21.046)
And I think that's an interesting distinction to make and is something I have thought a lot about, although I've thought of it more as like contentment and pleasure or contentment and happiness. Joy is just a different take on that. And I think to me, as many people as there are, it's probably how many definitions of the word joy there are. But I think it's interesting to try and thread that needle. And clearly it sounds like to you, she got close to making that distinction in a way that works and, but not
Jordan Maney (02:28.751)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (02:39.447)
Yes.
Becky Mollenkamp (02:49.454)
quite there, so like what was missing?
Jordan Maney (02:52.697)
I think for me, when she, okay, in the first part, I have like it written, I have the printed version out with me and like my notes, because I took a lot of notes.
Becky Mollenkamp (03:01.678)
Perfect. Just make sure you're talking to the mic. There we go.
Jordan Maney (03:05.386)
Into the mic. I think the two things that I noticed, one is when she's making that distinction between pleasure and joy, like, it's pleasure being kind of like more than the ordinary satisfaction, and joy kind of being like a ramped up extension of that. And then she kind of plays on that throughout the rest of the essay and comes to a conclusion that is where I'm like close but not necessarily there about it.
I think a lot of people share this idea that joy is just this like, it's just kind of like happiness 2.0.
just kind of like, yeah, if it happens, it happens. It's kind of...
something she uses it, I think she says it at least twice, arrives at, like when joy arrives, or like as if it's not running parallel to you at all times, and is accessible to you at all times. So I thought that was really interesting the way that she kind of opens it up with this idea that like, well, I know what pleasure is, and I give myself a little bit of pleasure every day, but then what does, what is joy and her trying to...
outline these experiences that she has and kind of questioning like, was that a joy? I know my kid is a form of joy for me, but there's something else alongside that too, of just kind of like, it's kind of terrifying. So I think...
Becky Mollenkamp (04:41.176)
Yeah, because she said joy is basically like the definition that I kind of got because there's a place where it sort of says this that it's terror, pain, and delight kind of all mixed together to become joy. And that's where like I didn't see it necessarily as happiness, but as this like bittersweet kind of feeling of like this deeper thing than happiness that it's like.
Jordan Maney (04:48.026)
Mm-hmm.
Yes.
Jordan Maney (05:02.369)
Hmm.
Becky Mollenkamp (05:08.642)
The fear of losing whatever it is is so painful that you know, like it's like you can't know it unless you know that it could end and that it's like the, it's the knowing of how much it would hurt that is what makes a joy, which is interesting. But then the, well, go ahead. And I'll tell you something, cause I was thrown off by the drug references and we can come back to that, but you.
Jordan Maney (05:23.653)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (05:32.091)
If that part I was like, okay, Zadie, I get what you're trying. think I got, yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (05:37.291)
Not that I have any problem with like, yeah, it's fine. Use ecstasy, do whatever. But I was like, if that's joy, then that to me, your examples of joy are motherhood, parenting, children, and then ecstasy, I was like, I don't know. Like that one felt like it was, and I know she sort of said, is that joy or not? But it was sort of like that if that's the only five or six times in your life you've experienced joy and one or two of those was, you know, ecstasy, I sort of felt like it kind of takes away from.
Jordan Maney (05:46.447)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (05:54.255)
Mm-hmm.
Becky Mollenkamp (06:04.674)
joy, in a way.
Jordan Maney (06:08.513)
Yes, and I think maybe, maybe this is an assumption that she was trying to show.
trying to show, God, I just lost my train of thought, but trying to show that the contrast of this kind of organic thing happening with motherhood and then feeling like you have to do something to get it, like you have to go to some extreme to arrive at the feeling. For me personally, this is not me getting on a soapbox. this is the part where I think she kind of gets to, especially towards the end.
Grief and joy are two sides of the same coin. Grief is not sustainable, but survivable because joy runs alongside it. Right? And like, can I cuss? I can cuss, right? Okay.
Becky Mollenkamp (07:02.2)
course yes.
Jordan Maney (07:05.733)
We get through the shit because we know that joy is available to us, right? Like, I'm not giving any spoilers away, but I did see sinners. I don't know when this is gonna come out. And I'm not, again, not giving any spoilers away, but it also plays with that theme as well. That grief and joy don't even just run parallel to each other, that they kind of, I don't wanna say that for the same thing, but they're dependent on each other. You can have...
Becky Mollenkamp (07:11.438)
Mm.
Becky Mollenkamp (07:31.95)
Now you have me curious because I know there's twins in the movie. I wonder if the each twin represent, but you don't have to give too much away. I'm just curious. No Okay, okay
Jordan Maney (07:38.299)
I can't wait for you to watch it. But just that idea that you cannot have one without the other. They kind of go alongside. So in that way, I get when she's talking about the terror or the fear, or as you put it perfectly, it being bittersweet. think of the last time I was in New Orleans, there's this photojournalist who had this really beautiful gallery like 10 years after Katrina.
and things that are still broken, pain that people still feel. That's like a perfect city when I think of that conversation between like grief, the history of New Orleans, the blood in the land when you think about New Orleans, and then also the joy when you think about a city like that and the fun and the festiveness and like let the good times roll. Like they coexist with all that death and sadness and grief. There's so much.
life and excitement and good times, they coexist with one another. And so reading this was interesting because one, you could kind of feel her hesitation around joy in general. Because I think
I people are afraid of it because some, we all kind of have like, it cost something? Is it going to cost us something to be in joy, to enjoy something? And then if it feels good, I'm scared I'm not gonna be able to access it again or someone's gonna come take that away from me.
Becky Mollenkamp (09:21.996)
Yeah.
Jordan Maney (09:22.511)
So I thought that was just like an interesting kind of like, it's not necessarily like stated. She doesn't like say that, but it's kind of like an undercurrent for me that I read into just kind of like, I'm afraid of it.
Becky Mollenkamp (09:34.348)
for
Well, I I think the way it concludes and I have this because the entire last bit of it was so good talking about it hurts as much as it's worth, which is the grief piece of that, right? Grief relating it to grief, that grief hurts as much as it's worth because you don't have grief unless there was something there that was love, right? And that's the cost of that love that we all, if we live long enough, have to pay, right? We have to pay that toll to have love. And you're right. There are people who will be like,
Jordan Maney (09:42.885)
So good, I wrote it down. Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (10:00.805)
Yep. Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (10:05.612)
I'll avoid love then because I don't want the pain. And she even brings it down to pets and forever. It's just any time that you're saying, I'm willing to take this risk of love, I know that if I were to live long enough and outlive this, there is always eventually a toll to pay unless I happen to be the one who goes first and then they pay the toll. But either way, that toll is getting paid, right? And so she said, what an arrangement. Why would anyone accept such a crazy deal? Surely if we were as
Jordan Maney (10:09.465)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (10:26.339)
Yeah. Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (10:34.924)
If we were sane and reasonable, we would every time choose a pleasure over a joy, as animals themselves sensibly do. At the end of a pleasure brings no great harm to anyone after all, and can always be replaced with another of more or less equal worth. And that helped me, that actually, that last paragraph helped me the most in understanding this distinction between pleasure and joy, because I was like, yeah, I get a lot of pleasure out of a croissant, right? And it does fill me with pleasure, but is it joy? Because it's very fleeting.
And once the croissant's gone, like I might be a little sad there's not another croissant for me to dig into, but also I know I can go get another one if I really want, right? So it's replaceable and there's no great sadness. It's not like I have this cost of like, maybe if it were the last croissant on earth, it would be a joy because I would know when I'm done with this croissant, I will never have one again. So I could either savor it, like save it and look at it and think about it and never have it, never allow myself the joy, but then I never have to have the sadness of there never being another.
Jordan Maney (11:11.256)
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (11:33.19)
Or I eat it and I savor it and I love it. And the whole time I'm probably thinking, I'll never get this again. I'll never get this again. And I was like, ooh, that. So I really almost think like the whole thing is boiled down to that last graph of like, that is the distinction between these two things. And whether you call that happiness, which I don't, because I also think of happiness as being very fleeting. I think of joy is a bit more along the lines of contentment, like I said. But I can also see what she's saying, because contentment can be more sustainable.
Jordan Maney (11:55.749)
Mm-hmm.
Becky Mollenkamp (12:03.148)
I think. And I do see this joy is like fleeting, but in a different way than I think pleasure or other things are fleeting. It's fleeting in that we know it eventually has a finite end. And that is what makes it so valuable to us. Yeah, but that's just where I thought the ecstasy I was like, hmm, but I do hear what you're saying that it's like this, this pain that we take to get that fleeting moment of that feeling. I've just never done ecstasy. So maybe that's why I don't understand it. But I was kind of like, hmm.
Jordan Maney (12:03.439)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (12:08.014)
Yeah.
Jordan Maney (12:17.125)
Yeah.
Jordan Maney (12:26.127)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (12:31.331)
No, same, same. thought the way towards the tail end, I think this is right after the section that you read. Joy is such a human madness was perfect because I really can't think of a more human thing. Like if you were to explain what it is to be a human to a life form that is not, I would say grief and joy. would say joy.
Cause you can have grief without joy. I don't think that you can have joy without grief. I don't think you can, like, cause that, not if you live long enough, just because I think like what you said as well, happiness, contentment, satisfaction, like, yeah, you can have that. But joy feels like such a deeper thing.
Becky Mollenkamp (13:11.104)
if you live long enough.
Becky Mollenkamp (13:31.31)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (13:31.503)
that really hits on what it means to be human, what it means to rise after falling or feeling like someone is trying to take you down in the context of being like a black woman and having grown up in church like.
Joy was always such an interesting, not an aspirational thing. And that's, think why reading this and was like the language around arriving at was interesting to me because, you know, my parents grew up in the Jim Crow South, like before the Voting Rights Act, like they were born before that. My...
mom's mom was born in the unincorporated land around the plantation her grandmother was born on. Right? So like, if you make joy this aspirational thing, then you'll never experience it. You'll never get it. But if in the muck and mire and the pain and the despair and the grief, you can still find something that
shifts you beyond the happiness, beyond the contentment, but makes you feel like, I'm alive. And that doesn't mean like jumping out of a fucking plane. Like it doesn't have to be this extreme thing, right? It could be a night out with your friends where you're just like absolutely goofing and get into some ridiculous stuff for no reason. But you remind yourself of like
why you're here and why you've connected with these people and why these relationships matter to you. For me, joy is something that when you really just let it in, it changes you. You leave changed. It's not just like, so when you're talking about the croissants, I can go to a local bakery here. It's like three levels. If I went to HEB, the greatest grocery store in the world,
Becky Mollenkamp (15:31.256)
Yeah.
Jordan Maney (15:43.609)
I could get a decent croissant and it'd be good and I'd eat it and be like, mmm, yummy and go about my day. Or I could go to Bakery Lorraine and have like a croissant and that could be like, mmm, a lovely part of my day, a little highlight. It tasted really good, Satisfaction. Or I could find, I could go through the process of finding like a small cafe somewhere in Paris that has been owned by a family for like,
over 100 years and I could watch the handwork of them rolling out the do you know what I mean? you. Yes. And they're telling you the story and you're taking in the sensory experience of everybody else enjoying this. Like it's one of the reasons why rest and joy are so important to me because they truly require you to be present. And like.
Becky Mollenkamp (16:20.588)
Yes, they make the butter and they've got the best salt from the sea. Yes.
Jordan Maney (16:43.119)
happiness, contentment, satisfaction. I don't really have to be present for those. Like they wash over you and it feels nice, right? But joy, it like gets into you. Like it touches a nerve some type of way. It changes something. like, I went, the difference between me going to HUB to get a croissant and me in that whole story, like I leave from that story change, like something.
has shifted, not to go all wicked, but something has changed within me. Like something's shifted, right? Versus HUB, it's like, okay, it's accessible. here, or not accessible, but it's like low lift. It's right there. Cool, got it.
Becky Mollenkamp (17:14.498)
No? Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (17:25.976)
Well, I think that to me gets the part and I feel like maybe this is the part that you have some issue with. So I'm interested to hear because she talks about that. OK, so a great struggle that precedes joy and there's like a struggle that precedes joy. And then that's when you know you are in joy. You have entered the emotion and you've disappeared inside of it. You're transformed and sort of become joy. Right. So she says when you have pleasure, it's something you want to experience. But joy is something that you are.
Jordan Maney (17:41.851)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (17:55.66)
And I'm kind of hearing that a bit in what you're saying of like, if I'm at that, I'm there, it's this whole experience and I've become part of it. I'm wrapped up in it. And now it's like, I am the croissant. And like this whole thing is just this thing that washes over and you become part of it you're almost lost in it. And that to me fits what she's saying about joy. But then I heard you saying earlier, maybe I'm interested to know the part where you feel like there's like, this doesn't quite feel right. Because it sounded like you were saying that it's that piece of the, becoming something, something you have to like,
enter that didn't feel right to you and I could be off but
Jordan Maney (18:26.337)
Mm-hmm. No, no, no. For me, I think the illustration of like going to Paris and getting the croissant illustrates her version of like arriving at joy. Like there have to be like things to have to like fall in place for you to get there. But you might be the person who can go to ATB and get that croissant and get the joy. Like do you know?
Becky Mollenkamp (18:55.918)
So you're saying that you like the idea of joy being, or that you believe joy can be more accessible, that you don't have to have that, the pain of doing the research and making the trip and the whole thing in order to access joy.
Jordan Maney (18:56.025)
It doesn't necessarily.
Jordan Maney (19:02.565)
Yeah, for-
Jordan Maney (19:06.958)
Yeah. Because the pain is already in the living, if we're being honest, right? Do you what I mean? Like you don't, and and just like thinking of like an ancestral example, like they weren't freaking going to Paris to get, they had Bengues at home. They weren't thinking about going to Paris to go get them. Like, so I just think that it, is there something, I don't want to say struggle, struggle is the word where I was like.
Becky Mollenkamp (19:11.918)
Isn't that true? Yes. Yes!
Jordan Maney (19:34.991)
It doesn't have to precede the joy, I'm not saying that right. There doesn't have to be a specific struggle to precede the specific joy that comes after struggles already in the living.
Becky Mollenkamp (19:48.11)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (19:48.891)
Pain is already in living, grief is already there. But if you can find a way to still say like, I'm gonna take this moment to just be present, and this might be my growing up churchy background, but like every Sunday, sometimes Wednesdays for Bible studies as well, you had that container and time. My dad would say this to me when he would like make the church bulletin to get printed out.
Becky Mollenkamp (19:50.636)
Yeah.
Jordan Maney (20:15.513)
He was very like, he's military guy, so he was very like, we're gonna do this at this time and this at that time, but always leave room for the Holy Spirit. And I have taken that to be like, always leave space for spontaneity to be present. So if you already have this container in time, and I'm sure you've seen like how certain congregations express themselves, like black congregations express themselves and like,
the historical context of being outside of working, singing, dancing, and going to church on the plantation was like the only time you got to physically express yourself, physically like express an homage to where you came from and who you are. Like those were moments of joy and literal captivity. Do you know what I mean? Like, so the idea that it has to be arrived at,
versus
allowing yourself to receive it. Like preparing the space yourself to just open yourself, just open yourself, joy, just open yourself to it. Hair flip. I put it in an email like last year, but I've totally forgot about it until right now. And I was like, yeah. But just open yourself to it because again, there's enough grief and struggle in living.
Becky Mollenkamp (21:19.501)
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (21:29.742)
Did you just come up with that or you've had it in your backpack?
I love it.
Becky Mollenkamp (21:42.734)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (21:46.267)
There's enough stress and pain and living, but joy is that thing that if you can be, if you can prepare room for it, it's always there. And it doesn't need a high lift. It doesn't need you to take ecstasy at a party to feel it. You know, it's always there.
Becky Mollenkamp (22:04.753)
Right.
Well, and that's what I'm when you were talking about it being and she also that part about joy is such a human madness, which I love that line, something to get a tattoo of or something. But it made me think about the fact that it feels like joy is a choice and that the part that's madness is that often not always, though, I agree. I think that there are places where you can have joy that don't necessarily have to have that inevitability of grief necessarily. Although I do I can see where she's going with that. And I do love that. But I think it's about
choosing something and knowing that often you're making a choice for something that could potentially cause you pain, right? Especially in the forms of like love and things like that. And so that is the part that makes it uniquely human is that we might make a choice that could actually hurt, right? Because I think most animal species and let's be honest, our lizard brains as well, typically try to choose anything that won't hurt, right? So that's why I think a lot of people avoid love or other
Jordan Maney (23:04.441)
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (23:07.982)
possibility because of that fear and that makes sense. So I think it's choice. But then I also think I love what you're about presence because it feels like noticing. It's like I want to make the choice to experience experience much more joy. Okay. But then it requires noticing because as you said, like I think almost any moment could be filled with joy if only we made a choice to look for it and then actually noticed it. And then like the savoring piece, the like being with it.
Jordan Maney (23:27.994)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (23:32.197)
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (23:36.91)
Right? Like, I just think that's so important because when I think so this, mean, obviously, and you probably to a piece like this gets you thinking about, OK, well, when have I experienced joy? Right. Like, let me think about that, especially by her definition. And I don't have like, I mean, obviously, I have my child and I understand there for sure where she's coming from with motherhood, because children are uniquely equipped to hurt you, both literally getting them out of your body and then every moment after. And yet.
Jordan Maney (23:46.745)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (24:03.749)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Becky Mollenkamp (24:06.028)
you choose and again, think it's choice you choose again and again to say, I want this, I want this pain. It's worth it, right? But I also think of like little moments where there's just these moments where I will like be with my husband and look at him. And I just, it's the right set of things are going on that I can feel myself as she says, like becoming joy, like entering into something where it's almost like a trans like state, trans like state where you're like,
Jordan Maney (24:13.007)
Yeah. Ooh.
Becky Mollenkamp (24:35.842)
You get lost of time for a minute and recognize and just think like, wow, I am so grateful for him. I love him. Being with him in this room is amazing. How did this happen? where it happens in two seconds, but it feels like an eternity of this thought of being awash with that feeling. And I've had it with friendships and conversations like this sometimes, I feel that, where I'm just like, how did I get so lucky to be in a room and get to have these kinds of conversations with people?
So think sometimes it's like almost outside of your control, but I also think we could manufacture in a way more joy if we were able to be more present and like intentionally try to notice those things and get swept up in that feeling.
Jordan Maney (25:18.299)
kind of like, it's kind of like leaving a play setting at the table for joy. You know what mean? Like, you're not gonna feel it every moment of every day, but like when that, like it's so, and I think that's the other thing is you, it's a small word, but I think we put, we project a lot of like expectation and fear and emotion onto it. So we think joy has to be this big,
Becky Mollenkamp (25:24.983)
Mmm. Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (25:48.503)
manufactured thing.
But it's not like, the moment you, it's a tiny small moment where I'm sure like, it felt like this, like a ray of sunshine just like landed right on your husband. And you're just like looking at him like, my God. You know what I mean? Like it's these tiny little cracks where the light can come through. and we can remind ourselves that there is light. And I think it's, it's one of the reasons why.
you know, not to bring up how shit it is right now, right? Like it's just dark. It feels bleak. It feels scary. And most of us are just trying to get through day to day because like that's what we can control. That feels tangible and easy when we're not easy, but tangible and maybe easier to reckon with than like the big things that
Becky Mollenkamp (26:25.631)
Go for it.
Jordan Maney (26:50.583)
instability, evil, greed, corruption, that those things kind of like bring into the, it makes us question things about ourselves, our relationships, institutions, all that, right? And it's also very interesting to me because if joy is light, then the perfect place for it to be is in the dark.
Becky Mollenkamp (27:16.216)
where we need it the most. It's the only way to find our way out of it, right? But you know, I will say that having been I've been pretty public about the fact that I had fallen into a pretty good depression at the beginning of this year, coinciding with the inauguration coincidence. And it was I mean, I'm just now four months, three months later, starting to really come out of it. Partially thanks to medication. So there's also that and that is absolutely right, something we need to
Jordan Maney (27:17.691)
That's where we need it the most, right? And so...
Exactly.
Jordan Maney (27:43.141)
Love that.
Becky Mollenkamp (27:45.806)
honor and give space for as well. And that's helping me find light. But the thing that's hard is when you are in that dark space, right? When you're in the darkness and you know the thing you need is more light to come through. And when you have people saying, if you would just do this, get up and move, know, spend more time, like snuggle with your kid. The things that you know could start to bring in some of that light, maybe find some of that joy, it can feel so impossible to do in those moments. Yeah, it's so hard. And yet,
I guess that's why it's a, like there is still a choice and it can be hard. Like I also want to honor that sometimes that you can't, it feels impossible to make the choice. And when someone tells you it's a choice, you feel like, no, it's not. I have no choice right now. Right. But.
Jordan Maney (28:26.915)
But you feel a little like, fuck you, when people say that.
Becky Mollenkamp (28:31.672)
For sure, my husband heard that. as much as there's moments of sunlight on him, it's also easier in some ways to let the darkness flood and, you don't do this and you did that and that kind of a thing. And it can be hard to find those cracks of light sometimes, I think. And this is something she doesn't talk about, but I would love to hear from you because I think you and I share this, that to me, that is why making the choice, choosing joy, seeking it out.
Jordan Maney (28:48.313)
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (29:00.8)
finding it feels really revolutionary, liberatory, like a form of resistance. Because when the world and this is not to say specifically to depression and obviously like there again, I have medical intervention. So there are those things that we need to have help with. But in the case of my partner, let's say where sometimes it's easier just to look at all the darkness and in a world that makes me want to be like, you're a white man and F you. Right.
Jordan Maney (29:04.891)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (29:16.45)
Yeah.
Jordan Maney (29:28.655)
Mm-hmm.
Becky Mollenkamp (29:29.474)
Like there is something that says that I think is like for me to choose to find joy is sort of like a way of saying, I won't let you do what you want to do to me, patriarchy. I'm not going to let you win, right? Cause you want me to be in that dark space where I feel unable to move, unable to take action, unable to create change. If I can find my joy, that joy can sustain us, I think.
Jordan Maney (29:42.619)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Jordan Maney (29:55.887)
Yeah, yeah. I agree. When you were talking about this, this like visualization came in my head. You know how we always tell people, there's light at the end of the tunnel. There's light at the end of the tunnel. I think what Zadie put together.
leans into that. Like, why would you choose to walk towards the light when, you know, the walk is so arduous to get there, right? For me, you don't have to wait for the light at the end of the tunnel. You are light. The choice to allow joy to come in lights you up. You don't have to wait to get there.
Becky Mollenkamp (30:36.046)
Mmm.
Jordan Maney (30:44.175)
to experience it and if we're being very honest, optimistic as I am, as hopeful of a person as I am, I just think it's just ancestral. If we had to wait to get to the end of the tunnel, geez, you know what I mean?
Becky Mollenkamp (31:03.086)
Yeah.
Jordan Maney (31:03.173)
You gotta make light where you can. If that means like at this part of the tunnel, I'm cracking something open so a light can crack in, or if I'm recognizing I'm going to let that emanate from me by making the choice to be like, yeah, I'm in the dark, but you know what? There's a really cute Daisy right over here, or it's nice and cool in the middle of this tunnel, or like I could close my eyes for a little bit and not even notice the difference and just like listen.
It doesn't have to be this like fight.
Becky Mollenkamp (31:33.165)
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (31:39.468)
It makes me think of the name of Zadie's big breakout book, White Teeth, where it's like, or I can choose to smile and allow the brightness of my white teeth to illuminate the space directly in front of me. Right. Like I hear what you're saying, because we are light and we have access to that. Or I can open my eyes and let the, you know, the white of my eyes shine. And just knowing that, like, because this is so silly. But when you say that and I think about that book title, it's like there are science actually behind the fact that when you smile or laugh.
Jordan Maney (31:49.657)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (31:53.797)
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (32:08.834)
when it's fake, it starts to become real, right? Because our body's reaction to that is for it to become real. So when we open our eyes, we put on a smile or we start to laugh and we let that light out, even if it doesn't feel real, it can become real for us. That's really powerful.
Jordan Maney (32:10.203)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Jordan Maney (32:20.025)
Yeah.
Yeah. It's really powerful. think it was one of the first things I did after election results came in. I just started reading. I pulled out Audrey, Tony, Zora, James. What have the elders talked about when it comes to...
maintaining your softness and there's a line, there's a line in Beloved by Toni Morrison that I won't quote exactly because there's a little bit of a pejorative in there. But this younger man is talking to this, younger black man is talking to this older black man and he looks at him and he basically is like, how much are we supposed to take? Like.
How much are we supposed to take? And it's after a particularly brutal passage about something that the younger black man experienced, like truly horrific.
And he's looking to this older black man, like, how much are we supposed to take? Because I'm kind of, I'm already at my limit. I don't think I have space for more. And he responds all that you can. And it's just, I remember, there's so many times reading that book, I was like, I gotta put this down and go outside for a little bit. if I had to wait or give myself permission to experience joy.
Jordan Maney (33:59.289)
because like, gotta get through this struggle first and then I can and then I can. If you make it conditional, you'll never experience it. And so like shifting into thinking like it is accessible, it is running parallel to me at all times, it doesn't have to be this big undertaking, it does not have to be a struggle to access it. There is enough grief and pain and shit in life already.
but I can make the choice to make room for it. I can make the choice today to like let myself be present with the idea of it, even if I don't feel it. I think that there's something there that feels very like magical, Loki to me, around what it means to embody joy. I love that you said a wash. That just makes me so happy.
Becky Mollenkamp (34:50.603)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (34:56.667)
Cause it doesn't, it's not like being on your A game every day. It doesn't mean that like you're waking up at 5 a.m. Like it might not be something that you can necessarily schedule on the calendar, but it is this call to remind ourselves that we're here. We're alive. You still, even in the shit, have the opportunity to make something beautiful. Even in the shit, you have the opportunity to remind other people to shine their light.
Becky Mollenkamp (35:11.918)
Yeah.
Jordan Maney (35:25.293)
Even in the shit, you can still call your attention to something that's good and generative and beautiful and kind. Like we still have the ability to use our voices. We still have the ability to move our bodies. We still have the ability to reach out to one another. And I think that's the other part of joy and also rest is that like, once you realize like you're not in the tunnel alone.
Becky Mollenkamp (35:25.294)
Mmm.
Becky Mollenkamp (35:36.824)
Right.
Jordan Maney (35:56.463)
None of us are in the tunnel alone.
Becky Mollenkamp (35:58.968)
Right.
Jordan Maney (36:00.811)
Every single person that voted in this election did not vote for that motherfucker.
Becky Mollenkamp (36:07.022)
More than I think it was it more than half of us at least half of us did not
Jordan Maney (36:11.491)
Right? Like, and then the people who, like young people who couldn't vote, right? who are also probably like, get this guy out of here. Get this guy out of here. Right? So like, we're not alone in this. We're not alone in the tunnel and the tunnel. We don't have to think of the tunnel as this like horrible, bad place. Like the good, the joy, the happiness, even the satisfaction and contentment. They don't have to be.
Becky Mollenkamp (36:22.126)
Right.
Jordan Maney (36:40.953)
conditions of a struggle. They help us fight. They're accessible to us right now. So reading this was really fun and kind of like a challenge for me because I read it three times. So the first time I was like, I always like to just like skim because ADHD. The first time I read it,
I skimmed through it. was like, okay. And then the second time I like read it. And I just remember feeling this like, no, like, especially when she got to the ecstasy part, because I was like, no, you're missing it. No, you're missing it. No, you're missing it. Like you don't have to, you don't have to go outside yourself, right? To make these things happen. And I know I gave the illustration of like, okay, the different croissants.
But like, that's just to change an environment. That doesn't mean you have to get on a plane to go somewhere, right? That could be in your town or city. That could be in your backyard. That could be taking a moment to put your hands in the dirt to garden for a little bit. Like it's, they're just tiny choices and small moments that like when you're swimming, it's just coming up for air and filling your lungs for a little bit so that you can keep going. That's, and so the third time I read it,
Becky Mollenkamp (38:08.291)
Yeah.
Jordan Maney (38:12.013)
I appreciated that it felt, to me, close but no cigar, kind of incomplete of like, towards the end, when she says, it doesn't fit with the everyday. The thing, no one ever tells you about joy, is that it has very little real pleasure in it. And yet, if it hadn't happened at all, at least once, how would we live?
Right? Like we need it. It keeps us going. has kept everybody. Right? That's not living. It's surviving.
Becky Mollenkamp (38:45.366)
And is it living if you don't ever allow for it? That's, yeah. Cause that makes me think of those, as we've talked about that choice of people who I don't want to love because I don't want to be hurt. I don't want to take that risk because I'm afraid that I might, know, just things like putting myself out there and using my voice and stepping onto that stage or whatever, all of the fear that keeps us from doing it. And yes, we avoided that, the potential for the grief, the sadness, the hurt, the pain.
And yet, we living? Right? Is that living? Is it living to just avoid, to stay away from the things that might hurt us? No. And so I'm with you. I read it twice. And the first time I read it, I was like, oh, what was this thing we chose to read? Uh-oh. But then the second time, I just basically, skipped all the ecstasy part. I skipped the drug stuff because, you know, and I also, Zadie, if you're listening, because I'm sure you are, I have personal stuff around that too, because my brother died of a heroin overdose.
Jordan Maney (39:28.475)
You
Jordan Maney (39:33.145)
Mm-hmm.
Becky Mollenkamp (39:42.882)
I'm not a big drug user. just, and I don't know, for whatever reason, like it could be some of my own projections, but I left, that part just felt like really out of alignment with anything I think of for pleasure or joy. So I was just like, I'm not sure these feel like the weirdest examples to me. Okay. But so the second time I skipped that and by skipping that, I was able to really fall into the rest of it feeling like, yeah.
Jordan Maney (39:57.957)
Mm-hmm.
Becky Mollenkamp (40:10.326)
I do actually align with a lot of this because I can think about how it relates to so many of my experiences and what I would call those moments like I mentioned with my husband or these, you know, these moments of time where I, where time does kind of stop and I feel like I am the feeling of just, I think maybe I would have called it bliss. And I think she uses another word at one point, maybe ecstasy because she's talking about, maybe that's why she chose to tell the ecstasy stories.
Jordan Maney (40:34.714)
Hmm.
Becky Mollenkamp (40:38.274)
But yeah, the second reading for me was also better for that same reason. And that's why we read things more than.
Jordan Maney (40:41.507)
Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. I was trying to like, look at my notes really quickly. The idea that joy costs something. And then I think the word I would, when I first wrote this, the idea that joy costs something, the word I actually want to shift that into is that it risks something.
Becky Mollenkamp (41:09.128)
Mmm, yeah.
Jordan Maney (41:10.885)
There's a, there, I, doesn't have to be like a struggle that precedes the joy like she writes, but there is a risk to it. Is that like, you're gonna want either more or it's gonna draw your attention to something, but it does feel risky to be like, okay, this person might be the love of my life, but they also might, I might open myself up to them to do irreparable damage.
Becky Mollenkamp (41:38.062)
Yeah, or they might die and I'll lose them. Or even in the case of the croissant story, I can never have this exact moment with this exact group of people in this exact time and this weather and this like, yeah, you can't replicate it. And so what if I love it so much and I can never have it again? So, yeah, like I agree. I think there's a risk. So even in the moments that don't feel like as big as love. And I think those those are a lot of the examples that I think we often think of. But even in some of these other moments, it's like it's because.
Jordan Maney (41:40.859)
Exactly.
Jordan Maney (41:45.495)
ever again.
Becky Mollenkamp (42:06.434)
Joy feels like an experience, right? Like a thing you are. You can't replicate an experience because it is only in that moment. And that is risky.
Jordan Maney (42:08.441)
Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (42:15.769)
I think is risky, but also again, the human madness of it all, the human requirement and necessity of it all. Like, I think when we try to replicate or we try to manufacture and it falls flat, I cannot remember. There's a Japanese term for this that basically means what you said earlier.
Like we could go to Paris right now and go have the croissant and then the following year try and do it same weather, same clothes, like try and replicate it as much as possible. It's going to be different. That's the point. That's the good thing. It provides novelty and variety, right? When you try and like, this is, I think this was way back. It might've actually been when this was written, ironically.
Um, way back in like 2013, I worked at a wedding venue and we have like a big one of those like huge, like wedding extravaganza type events. um, David Tatera was like the mate, like keynote speaker. And this was at the height of like one of his main shows. So everybody was like, Oh my God, David. But he said something that I have never forgotten was that like your job as an event planner or designer is to essentially create a.
bubble for the people attending, creating a moment where when they enter this thing, they leave the worries of their life, you know, to the side and they can just be present within this bubble. And then at the end, they can come out and all that other stuff. And that has guided so much of what I do now is like, if we're going to create space or leave room for joy or spontaneity, if we're going to
create these opportunities, like it's okay for one, they're supposed to be different. They're supposed to be, you don't want the same thing over again. And I think sometimes our desire for them to be the same is us trying to control.
Becky Mollenkamp (44:26.528)
Yes. Yes, yes. And it's so funny, like what you're talking about makes me think of, you know, going to a concert if you've been to any sort of event lately in the last decade or more, this weird phenomenon of every person standing there and recording the thing that they're at instead of just experiencing the thing that they're at. I, my husband and I joke all the time, we love going to live music and we are like, so are they going to go home and just rewatch this horrible
Jordan Maney (44:28.239)
You know?
Becky Mollenkamp (44:56.126)
iPhone footage. I mean, I understand the like getting a five second clip to show I was here. Okay, fine. But like I see people who it's it's it can't stop. And it's like it's creating this layer between you and reality of being present. And I think we have all just become so accustomed to that to not being present to having a screen a something that's separating us from our reality. And like I feel like
Jordan Maney (45:19.77)
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (45:25.74)
that keeps us from joy because I'm thinking specifically of a concert I went to my favorite band at Red Rocks on a gorgeous night. The weather was perfect. I was there with my partner. The music was great. it just the view from that place is amazing. Like everything about it, sensory overwhelm. And I'm still thinking of it because I was present. I put my phone down and I and I even did the thing that we're talking about. I made the conscious choice to say I want to remember this. And sometimes I'll do like a
Jordan Maney (45:54.691)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yes!
Becky Mollenkamp (45:55.65)
to myself of like a mental photo to be like, okay, Becky, click in and be present. But I saw so many people there that were just like on their phone the whole time recording the thing. And I thought, gosh, be with this moment. Like there's a, yeah. And I don't know, it's just because it is that choice. And I feel like it's like they're wanting to replicate like, because it is so magical, right?
Jordan Maney (46:10.511)
Be with us.
Becky Mollenkamp (46:20.088)
I want to be able to hold on to some piece of this and somehow capture it again later, even if it's just watching it. And maybe that'll help me relive it. And maybe it does to some degree, but it's lightning in a bottle. You can't recapture it. So all you can really hope to do is just be with it so that you can embrace the most of it you can in the moment of it. And that to me is like the difference between maybe happiness and joy.
Jordan Maney (46:44.709)
Yes. I think when you were talking about having like witnessing it through the screen instead of just like being in it, I think that's another layer of like distance we put for safety. Like the illusion of safety to be like, well, I don't want to give myself over to this, this feeling or this emotion. don't, I don't want to be present because I don't want to lose this thing that I can't recapture.
Becky Mollenkamp (46:45.646)
or pleasure and joy.
Becky Mollenkamp (46:58.898)
Mmm, yeah.
Jordan Maney (47:13.773)
manufacture, recreate. But then I think it was, I think also 2013, 2014, I went to some concert with friends and I recorded a lot of it and I think I looked at it it was a great night and I think I looked at it like once.
Take the picture, get a little 90 second snap, and then just be there. Just let yourself be there. Because it's not gonna be the same for whatever it is.
Becky Mollenkamp (47:34.254)
Yeah. B.
Becky Mollenkamp (47:39.534)
for whatever it is. I mean, I mentioned concerts, but we do this everywhere. When I go to my kids' performances at school, which we have one tonight, and I will be honest, one of us will probably be recording the entire thing, because it's not that long. But yeah, it's like, I just want to be able to wash, like be a wash in it. Again, let it wash over me and be fully present. But I do think you're right. I think it is another way too of like, that like, I won't let this thing harm me, because if I...
Jordan Maney (47:44.09)
Yeah.
Jordan Maney (47:47.663)
No.
Yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (48:07.406)
do fully immerse myself, then I'm admitting in a way that I can't replicate this. And like, we want to hold on to some belief that we can, I think. And yeah, we have to, I think that's part of it is we have to, there is like a willingness to be human and to be vulnerable and to recognize our weakness that has to come for that joy. To be able to say, I recognize life is fleeting and that's why I need to be in this moment. And I think we want to try and again, that control, like say,
Jordan Maney (48:15.599)
We can, yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (48:35.902)
No, I'm going to somehow find a way to like game the system so that this moment lasts forever. And it just can't. But that is really hard. And I think that is the part she's talking about with the like the struggle. Not the best word, but of it.
Jordan Maney (48:44.215)
It's it's
Jordan Maney (48:51.483)
I think also for me, it's not so much a struggle that precedes the joy, it's surrender.
Jordan Maney (49:03.671)
Let just let it in. Just let it in. Just be here. Just enjoy. Let yourself like enjoy this thing. And I've I've found personally that when things feel the most uncertain and scary and bleak, I want to hold on and like fight joy or positive things in general because they feel so scarce.
Becky Mollenkamp (49:33.006)
Hmm.
Jordan Maney (49:34.467)
And I think when, so election night, the night after election results, right? I was like, I could feel that feeling coming over me. like, God, like the anticipation. Into the new year, inauguration happens, and it's only been three months at the time of this recording.
Becky Mollenkamp (49:55.234)
The longest, the longest three months of our lives, yes.
Jordan Maney (49:57.893)
Felt like a year, I just, I kind of felt like this tightening of like, every time I scroll, I've taken all social media off my phone. Every time I scroll and I'm just like, it's all bad. It's all bad. It's all bad. It's all bad. I feel this like, it's like I'm not even allowing, kind of like a dam. Like I'm just turning it off. Like no water is gonna flow through here. I'm just gonna block it all up and create this reservoir of like, that's when things are positive. Just gonna.
fucking suck on the other side of it, it's gonna be okay. And I keep coming back to this question that has gotten me out of these like depressive episodes, these little ruts and funks that have happened since literally only January of like, why not?
Jordan Maney (50:48.047)
Why not joy? Why not me experiencing joy right now? Why can't I enjoy myself?
Who's telling me that I cannot enjoy myself? Well, still, like I made a joke to my dad about going to the pool while it's still integrated. And he was like, Jordan. And I was like, why not? I might as well swim. Well, I still, well, I still can't, you know, knock on wood. I might as well do the things that don't necessarily have to do anything with capitalism, but like do the things that like feel good. might as well allow myself to be present even if it's.
of painful to get there first, right? Like, not painful, but if you're going to be present, in my mind, if present is like, presence is a precondition to just allowing that joy to wash over you, you have to be present to all that you're feeling. The bad, the ugly, the insecurities that are popping up, the fears that are popping up.
and maybe in that way what Zadie said about the struggle that precedes it, cool.
But like, you have to wade through that to get to the place of just being able to receive the joy. And if we're so afraid of that point and that part, right, of like, if you want to have a healthy long-term partnership with someone, you're have to some really difficult, uncomfortable conversations. But on the other side of that, there's some really beautiful stuff. So yeah, maybe there's that risk.
Jordan Maney (52:32.517)
that you have to get through. But again, if you don't risk it, if you don't take the risk of being present, if you don't take the risk of having those conversations, if you don't take the risk of like letting yourself feel, how are you going to get to any of the good things?
Becky Mollenkamp (52:49.506)
Yeah. We always say risk it for a biscuit in our family. And we do risk it for a biscuit a lot, which is our way of trying to help our kid learn that we have to, sometimes we do have to risk. And what you just said makes me come around even more to this essay in that it does feel like I do think that that's probably what she means by the struggle. And in that way, and honestly, as you were talking about that, I have to now admit that I'm coming around a bit more on the ecstasy and here's why.
Jordan Maney (52:53.445)
adorable writing that down.
Jordan Maney (53:10.959)
Mm-hmm.
Becky Mollenkamp (53:19.522)
Because I think the way she talks about it is, because she even questions, is that actually joy then? And I think it's because she's saying it's a shortcut. It's trying to do that thing where you're trying to control, you're trying to manufacture the feeling. Because now I'm thinking about my brother and his drug use and it's exactly what he was trying to do.
Jordan Maney (53:19.759)
Ooh.
Becky Mollenkamp (53:37.794)
because he couldn't seem to get there on his own. He was trying to manufacture the joy. He was trying to get this like shortcut, a work around to create the joy. And in that moment, it felt like joy to him, but it was so fleeting and wasn't really joy, probably not, but it created some of the feelings that we associate with joy. And so I think that that's probably what she's sort of saying. And by questioning whether it's you know.
Again, this is why I love discussing these things because where my immediate reaction is like, fuck now. Now I'm like, you sneaky little, think you're onto something there. Because I do think it's that it's the ways that we try to control. We try to manufacture, we try to create. And for some people it looks like drugs, but there's so many other ways we do that same thing because we don't want to have to do the hard part, the struggle part, right? We want to just get to the good part without all that other stuff. And is that really the joy? you know, yeah.
Jordan Maney (54:07.629)
Right.
Yeah.
Yeah, I think you're on to something.
Jordan Maney (54:30.095)
Yeah. I had a, I had a moment, had a wobble, if you will, the first week of April, it was very intense, very emotional. And I realized like, I had not been allowing myself to feel some things. And so I was like having like, I call them morning meetings where I feel like I'm talking to like birds and trees and ancestors. I'm just in the backyard, just like yapping. But I was like, Hey y'all.
Next time, maybe we can get to the breakthrough without the breakdown. Like that would be nice, right? But here you talk about it. It's like, I wrote it down, mimicking Joy's conditions. When you're talking about the manufacturing, the risk is part of it. You got to get in the water. You got to get in the, you got to cross the river if you want to get to the other side, right? Like you got to get in the water. You got to, you got to risk it.
Becky Mollenkamp (55:15.446)
It is.
Becky Mollenkamp (55:26.638)
Because otherwise the come down, that manufactured route, that not real route, I think in the moment you might be able to convince yourself it's joy, but then the fallout, the aftermath, the come down from that, I think you quickly realize that wasn't it. But because it felt, it was fleeting and it felt good. So then you start to chase and that's not the solution. So I feel like what she's saying is the solution isn't that it's not trying to manufacture it. It's not trying to railroad around it. It's like,
Jordan Maney (55:26.725)
Gotta risk it for a biscuit.
Jordan Maney (55:41.027)
And there, yeah.
Becky Mollenkamp (55:55.19)
It's learning that you have to be willing to accept the muck for the payoff and that that is life. And that's that uniquely human madness. So I, yeah, I love it. I love this discussion.
Jordan Maney (55:58.949)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Jordan Maney (56:05.135)
Yeah. I love that. I think you're, yeah. Right? This is right. think, I think that point is getting back to the human madness of it is the perfect way to conclude it because it is, it is a human madness. And yet I hope that you choose it again and again and again and again, cause it's worth it.
Becky Mollenkamp (56:29.398)
And in the world of AI and bots and everything else coming for us, this is what makes us human. So we've got to choose it. We have to choose it. Right. So thank you for. Yeah.
Jordan Maney (56:36.667)
I wanted to add this, I just wanted to add this really quickly. When you're talking about concerts, I was remembering when I went to for like, think South By in Austin, and it was Allen Stone, it was this tiny little set. And I was with friends who were like, what are you doing right now? Because they had their phones out, because it wasn't a big, it was like, maybe 100 people, it pretty small. They had their phones out, and I was just like, like.
I was like doing this and my eyes were closed and I was just like in it. They're like, look at him. And I was like, no, I need I'm just like letting this come over me. I'm trying to soak in everything that I'm hearing. Like, let me just have this moment. Right. And I just. But I think about that and I'm just like, oh, I don't think about it like, oh, man, I wish I could replicate it to get in a different concert. I'm just kind of like, I'm so glad that I got to experience that. And that should be on the other side.
of joy is not how can I make it exactly like that again and control it and manufacture it. But instead of like the come down that you were saying when you do manufacture it of like, I've got to chase it. It's more kind of like a lover leaving and being like, I can't wait to experience that again.
Becky Mollenkamp (57:50.818)
Yeah, it's like a how can I open myself up to receive more like that? Not that, but just more like that. Yeah. But you can't until you learn how to do it, which involves risking it for a biscuit, baby. So everyone go out and risk it this week and make yourself some joy. Thank you for being here, Jordan. You are joy. You are light. And I hope everyone else feels that way after hearing you say it, because it's true, we are all light. But truly, every time you're in a room with me, I'm always like,
Jordan Maney (57:54.983)
Leave the door open. Just leave the door open.
Jordan Maney (58:05.979)
you
Becky Mollenkamp (58:18.606)
The sunshine has entered, so thank you and thanks for doing this with me.
Jordan Maney (58:20.827)
Thank you, Becky. This was so great. I'm gonna like, I'm holding onto this printed version, because it really did challenge me, but this conversation, I think, brought it full circle, and I hope everybody else listening gets, go risk it for a biscuit, like Becky said.