Mark: Alright, Michelle. The book is Joy Is My Job. If you had to guess the author's actual job based on that title, what would it be? Michelle: Oh, easy. A golden retriever. Or maybe a professional hype-man for very sad clowns. Definitely not someone who has to deal with spreadsheets. Mark: Close! The author is Mary Katherine Backstrom, and what's incredible is that she writes about joy while being brutally honest about her own life—which includes being a cancer survivor and a vocal mental health advocate who deals with bipolar disorder. So this isn't a book from someone living on easy street. Michelle: Wow, okay. That changes everything. So the 'job' of joy is something she's had to actively work at, not something that comes naturally. Mark: Exactly. And she argues that most of us are going about it all wrong. We're chasing the wrong thing. Michelle: What, we're not supposed to want to be happy? That feels like a pretty fundamental human right, right up there with life, liberty, and the pursuit of... well, happiness. Mark: That's the Declaration of Independence, and Backstrom tackles it head-on. She says the problem is that our idea of happiness is a constantly moving target.

Michelle: I can definitely relate to that. The goalpost is always shifting. Once I get the promotion, then I'll be happy. Once I lose ten pounds, then I'll be happy. It never ends. Mark: Precisely. And she has this incredible, and frankly, hilarious story that illustrates this perfectly. She has bipolar 2 disorder, and she talks about a time she forgot to take her medication and slipped into a manic episode. Michelle: Okay, I'm listening. This feels like it's going to be a wild ride. Mark: It is. She gets infuriated by a local politician and, on a whim, tweets that she's going to run against him for Congress. The tweet starts to go viral. She's getting calls, messages, people are rallying. Michelle: That’s amazing! A political career is born from a single tweet. Mark: For about five minutes. Because almost immediately, her manic brain loses interest in politics and pivots to a new, better idea: she's going to open a food truck that sells only buttermilk biscuits. Michelle: Wait, a food truck for only buttermilk biscuits? That's... oddly specific and brilliant. I'd be a customer. Mark: Right? She builds a website, starts drafting a business plan, and is all-in. Meanwhile, her husband comes home and is like, "So, my coworkers told me you're running for Congress? You weren't going to mention that?" And she has to explain that she's moved on to biscuits. The whole thing implodes, she deletes the tweet, and the manic high is followed by a crushing wave of humiliation and depression. Michelle: This story is funny, but it's also deeply vulnerable. She's using her own mental health crisis to make a point about how we all chase these fleeting, intense goals. That takes guts. Mark: It really does. And her point is that what we call 'happiness' is often that manic, biscuit-food-truck energy. It's intense, it's thrilling, but it's unsustainable and often leads to a crash. It's a finish line that moves as soon as we get close. Michelle: So happiness is the manic high, and the crash is the inevitable result. What's the alternative? What is this 'joy' then? Mark: This is the core of the book. She introduces this beautiful analogy from her childhood. Her mom was a master gardener with pristine flower beds. But as a kid, Backstrom would pick these little purple weeds from the cracks in the sidewalk—a plant called henbit—and bring them to her mom, calling them "Fraggle Rock Flowers." Michelle: That’s adorable. I can just picture it. Mark: And her mom, instead of correcting her, taught her a lesson. She said that flowers are beautiful, but they are fragile. They need perfect soil, the right amount of sun, and constant care. If conditions aren't perfect, they wither and die. That's happiness. Michelle: Okay, I see where this is going. Mark: But weeds, she said, are different. A weed has a wild constitution. It will bloom wherever it's planted. It slurps up rain with a smile and springs up in the cracks of all kinds of chaos. A weed knows how to flourish in situations that would kill a hothouse flower. That, Backstrom says, is joy. Michelle: So joy is the emotional equivalent of a dandelion. It's stubborn, it's resilient, and it shows up even when you don't want it to. I love that. It feels so much more attainable than a perfect, prize-winning rose. Mark: It's a complete reframing. Stop trying to build a perfect, fragile greenhouse for happiness. Instead, learn to spot and appreciate the tough, resilient weeds of joy that are already growing in the messy, cracked sidewalks of your actual life.

Michelle: Okay, I love the weed analogy. It feels so much more attainable. But what's the main thing that kills even the toughest weeds? For me, it's looking over at my neighbor's perfect garden. It's comparison. Mark: You just perfectly transitioned to the second half of the book. She says comparison is, famously, the "thief of joy." And she tells another story that is so painfully relatable it should come with a trigger warning for anyone who's ever felt like an imposter. Michelle: Oh, I am ready for this. Lay it on me. Mark: It's Thanksgiving. Her mother-in-law asks her to bring a dessert. Now, Backstrom is, by her own admission, not a baker. But in a moment of wanting to impress, she volunteers to bring a pecan pie. Michelle: A classic blunder. Never volunteer for the thing you can't do. Mark: She fully intends to learn, but life gets in the way. So, in a panic, she goes to the grocery store, Publix, and buys two of their finest pecan pies. But she can't just show up with a store-bought pie. That would be admitting defeat. Michelle: Oh no. I know what's coming. The great deception. Mark: She gets home, surgically removes the pies from their foil tins, throws away all the evidence, and re-wraps them in her own foil to pass them off as homemade. She calls it "The Great Pie Lie." Michelle: This is giving me second-hand anxiety. Mark: It gets worse. At Thanksgiving dinner, everyone is raving about the pie. Her husband's uncle declares it the best pecan pie he's ever had. And then he turns to her and asks the single most terrifying question you can ask a pie-faker. Michelle: Don't say it. Mark: "What's your secret for the crust? Is it a butter crust or a shortening crust?" Michelle: Oh no! The crust question! That is my actual nightmare. I am sweating just hearing this. She had to confess, right? Mark: She did. The lie crumbled, and she was left with this mix of shame and relief. And the story became family legend. But her point is so powerful. She was so consumed with comparing herself to this idealized version of a daughter-in-law who bakes perfect pies that she couldn't even enjoy the holiday. The joy was stolen. Michelle: That is the perfect example of what she calls the 'thief of joy.' She wasn't enjoying Thanksgiving; she was performing a version of herself she thought she should be. And for what? Pie approval? It's absurd, but we all do it. Mark: We do. And she connects this to a deeper feeling she's had her whole life. She uses this metaphor of a child's shape-sorting toy. She says she feels like a star-shaped block, and for her entire life, she's been trying to violently jam herself into the circle-shaped hole. It just doesn't fit, and it's exhausting. Michelle: The "Paper Plate Person" in a world of "Pinterest People." I remember that from the book. It's such a great way to put it. Some people are just not designed for intricate, crafty, perfect things. And that's okay. Mark: Exactly. She's saying that a huge part of finding joy is to stop trying to be a circle when you're a star. Stop lying about the pie. Accept that you're a Paper Plate Person, and recognize that paper plates are incredibly useful! They get the job done. Joy comes from accepting your own shape, not from trying to contort yourself into someone else's.

Michelle: So, if I'm getting this right, the book's argument is that we're on a wild goose chase. We're trying to build a perfect, fragile greenhouse for 'happiness' while simultaneously trying to be a different shape to fit into someone else's life. It's an exhausting, impossible game. Mark: Exactly. And Backstrom's solution is revolutionary in its simplicity. Stop. Stop chasing the moving finish line of happiness. Stop trying to be the Pinterest mom with the perfect pie. Instead, look down. Look at the cracks in your own messy sidewalk. Michelle: Find the weeds. Mark: Find the weeds. The 'crazy joy' she talks about is already there, growing defiantly. It's the laughter during a crisis, like her friends joking about Fort Myers stealing their nipples after a mastectomy. It's the love in an imperfect family. It's the honesty that comes after the pie lie is exposed. Michelle: It's not about ignoring the pain or the mess. It's about finding the joy within it. The joy isn't the absence of suffering; it's the force that defies it. That feels so much more real and powerful than just being 'happy.' Mark: It really is. It makes you wonder, what's one 'store-bought pie' you've been trying to pass off as homemade in your own life? Michelle: That's a heavy-hitter question to end on. And a really good one. We'd love to hear your thoughts. Find us on our socials and share your 'pie lie' stories. We promise a judgment-free zone. Mark: This is Aibrary, signing off.