Today marks 20 years since I arrived in Canada. I landed at Vancouver International Airport on August 1, 2006. I started my first job in Whistler, B.C., then lived in numerous communities across Canada before finally settling in the Yukon.

I preach movement 😊 This clip is from my event in Victoria (BC) last week. Drop some words if you’re a movement lover!

Hard days will come the way weather comes, sometimes predicted and sometimes sudden. When they arrive, try to meet them with a steadier story. Tell yourself that difficulty is part of being alive, not a stain on your character. Tell yourself that you can carry joy like a pocket stone.

Victoria, BC! Let’s reconnect 🤗

A friendly reminder: life can feel heavy and sometimes even brutal, but make space to look for joy each day, in every small opportunity, even in the midst of rough times.

In recent weeks, I saw a couple of friends after a long time, and they shared how much sadness they’re carrying. It made me wonder: why is there so much sadness in the world? What happened to us? Why does so much pain live in our hearts?

After I received the Meritorious Service Medal at Rideau Hall in Ottawa from the Governor General of Canada, the Honourable Louise Arbour, the Rideau Hall staff invited me to do a move or two. It was time to test if I could do it in the limits of a suit 😊

Today at Rideau Hall in Ottawa, a joyful moment talking with the Governor General of Canada, the Honourable Louise Arbour, who presented me with my medal along with other distinguished Canadians.

Hello, Ottawa! I arrived here to receive an award from the Governor General tomorrow. This is happening because of your love, dear people 🙏🏽

Joy, in the healthiest sense, is not the loud promise that everything will be fine. Joy can be as small as the smell of tea in a warm mug, as quiet as a raven’s wingbeat, as simple as a neighbor waving from across a snowy road. It does not erase pain. It sits beside it and says, “I am here too.”

When I deliberately embarked on this path toward joy, I discovered something transformative. As joy gradually began to heal my wounded spirit and lift me from the depths of that persistent sadness, I felt compelled to share my experiences with others.

Joy, in the healthiest sense, is not the loud promise that everything will be fine. It is not a bright sticker pasted over a cracked window. Joy is a steady, clear-eyed willingness to notice what is good without denying what hurts.

We come into this world with the capacity for sadness as part of our human nature, but finding joy requires conscious effort and dedication and learning to find how to co-exist with sadness.

If you are searching for happiness, start with something small and honest. Step outside for a minute and feel the air. Thank your body for carrying you. Speak gently to yourself, especially when you have failed. Let sadness have its place, like a shadow that proves there is light nearby.

One day I was thinking how easy it is to confuse positivity with denial. Denial is a kind of desert. It drains everything, including the truth. Healthy positivity is more like a well. It does not reject tears. It holds them.

Dance has become more than a performance for me. It has become a way of meeting myself in silence. When I move, feelings have somewhere to go. Grief can travel down my arms. Anxiety can leave through my feet. Hope can rise through my chest without pretending everything is fine.

In my own life, I try to treat joy like a lamp I tend, not a spotlight I chase. I feed it with simple practices: moving my body, calling someone I care about, doing work that feels aligned, letting silence do its healing. I celebrate what is good, and I do not demand that goodness be permanent.

When I lift my arms under an open sky, I am not trying to outrun sadness. I am giving it space to breathe.

Some hearts speak through work, through care, through silence, through art, through prayer, through walking until the mind softens. Tears are one way of telling the truth, not the only way.

In my own life, I try to treat joy like a lamp I tend, not a spotlight I chase. I feed it with simple practices: moving my body, calling someone I care about, doing work that feels aligned, letting silence do its healing. Expectation wants permanence. Hope makes peace with seasons.

If there is one thing the Yukon teaches, it is that light returns, but it returns on its own time. The healthiest positivity I know is the patience to wait without collapsing, and the courage to act without guarantees.

When adversity strikes, our minds naturally gravitate toward threat detection and problem amplification. Healthy positivity interrupts this pattern by redirecting our cognitive resources toward possibility rather than limitation.

Life naturally comes with difficulties, the way oceans come with tides and gardens come with weeds. The mistake is to think that struggle is a sign you are doing life wrong.

The desire to solve life is often the desire to outgrow uncertainty. But uncertainty is not a flaw in the design. It is part of the texture. We cannot know every ending, yet we can choose how to inhabit the middle. We cannot prevent every grief, yet we can learn to meet grief with tenderness.

Hard days will come the way weather comes, sometimes predicted and sometimes sudden. When they arrive, try to meet them with a steadier story. Tell yourself that difficulty is part of being alive, not a stain on your character. Tell yourself that you can carry joy like a pocket stone.

Dear word-lovers, I hope you are doing well. I am writing today with some exciting news: starting now, when you order two or more copies of The Gurdeep Magazine, shipping will be completely free. gurdeep.ca/magazine

Guarding your energy does not mean building a fortress and never letting anyone in. It means learning what drains you and naming it honestly. It means taking breaks before exhaustion forces them. It means saying no without writing a novel of explanations.

In the middle of any struggle, there is also the question of light. Not the blinding kind that pretends everything is fine, but the steady kind that helps you keep going. Joy, hope, and positivity are not decorations you hang only in good seasons. They are tools.

Our relationship with sadness runs deep because sadness is not a single emotion. It is a convergence of love, memory, limit, and longing. It is the honest response to change in a world we do not fully control. When we approach sadness with respect, it often reveals a quieter strength.

Dear friends, I have exciting news: my magazine is now on bookstore shelves. Munro’s Books in Victoria, BC, Canada has officially become the first bookstore to carry it. Please stop by the store at 1108 Government Street to pick up your copy.