We're talking about self-alignment today—the final piece of our self-connection series and perhaps the most challenging. What does it really mean to be "comfortable in your own skin"? More than just knowing yourself (self-awareness) or accepting yourself (self-acceptance), self-alignment is about acting in ways consistent with your authentic values, preferences, and internal states. We'll dig into the obstacles of self-alignment and strategies to overcome them, including designing a "values tattoo" that visually captures what matters most to you.

p.s., Find your Simple Joy practice for this episode right here at our blog.

About: The Joy Lab Podcast blends science and soul to help you cope better with stress, ease anxiety, and uplift mood. Join Dr. Henry Emmons and Dr. Aimee Prasek for practical, mindfulness-based tools and positive psychology strategies to build resilience and create lasting joy.

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Sources and Notes:

• Joy Lab Program: Take the next leap in your wellbeing journey with step-by-step practices to help you build and maintain the elements of joy in your life.
• Self-connection series:
• Making Self-Connection Your Superpower in 2026 [ep. 243]
• The Practice of Self-Awareness: Why You're Worth Knowing [ep. 244]
• Stop Waiting to Accept Yourself: The Truth About Unconditional Self-Acceptance [ep. 245]
• The Power of Self-Alignment & Reclaiming Your True Self [ep. 246]
• Self-acceptance episodes:
• No Need to Hurry, No Need to Sparkle, No Need to Be Anybody But Yourself [ep. 160]
• Accept Yourself Just As You Are & Then You Can Change [ep. 150]
• How to Change: External vs Internal Motivators [ep. 145]
• Authenticity series:
• Unmasking Your True Self: Exploring Authenticity and Awe [ep. 216]
• Embrace Your True Self: Accepted, Connected, & In The Game [ep. 217]
• The Road Most Travelled: Awakening Through Suffering [ep. 218]
• Follow Your Bliss: Awakening to Joy [ep. 219]
• The Still Small Voice: Awakening with Soulfulness [ep. 220]
• More on inspiration and goal-setting:
• Inspiration: The Engine of Joy" ... gives some great basics for this element of inspiration) [ep. 10]
• Resolution #1: You Don't Need to Be Fixed [ep. 40]
• The Myths of Change [ep. 41]
• Five Principles for Inspired Change (or something that looks remarkably like it) [ep. 42]
• Harmonious vs. Obsessive Passions [ep. 43]
• May Sarton: "Now I become myself. It's taken time, many years, and places I have been dissolved and shaken, worn other people's faces."
• Parker Palmer: "What a long time it can take to become the person one has always been. How often in the process we mask ourselves in faces that are not our own."
• Mahatma Gandhi: "Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony."

Full transcript available here

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