Sometimes the people who love us need to help us notice when we’ve just done something courageous, beautiful, difficult, or downright wonderful... Let's pause long enough to let the good thing count.

Hey Beautiful Light Beams!

PAUSE & APPLAUSE began in our Joy-Based Living Honor Circle.

Someone would share something amazing they had
done, experienced, or found the courage to face...
and then keep right on talking.

Before we knew it, they might
minimize the accomplishment,
downgrade the story,
or simply move past it
before the rest of us had a chance to reflect back what we had just witnessed.

So we agreed on a group norm:

you are allowed to gently interrupt a good story in order to honor it.

Here's how it works:

When someone says something worth celebrating,
here's what happens:

Someone raises two index fingers and holds them upright,
side by side, like the pause symbol on a video.

One by one, the other members join in until the storyteller finally stops.

Then together we say:

PAUSE...

and we applaud.

APPLAUSE!

It was a little awkward at first,
but the group loved it.
There was just one thing missing:
a name!

One day while I was with my friend Heather,
we were tossing ideas around.
We were close, but nothing quite had that YES, THAT’S IT feeling.
Then Lyle walked in.

We explained what we needed,
and almost immediately he said:

“Pause and Applause.”

YES!

More than a year later, we still use it regularly,
with great joy and occasionally some very friendly awkwardness.

We love it because
sometimes the people who love us
need to help us notice
when we’ve just done something
courageous,
beautiful,
difficult,
or downright wonderful.

Pause long enough to let the good thing count.

We put our beloved PAUSE & APPLAUSE ritual on a shirt,
complete with our flying cow and two wildly enthusiastic pigs!

​Here's the PAUSE & APPLAUSE shirt in our Joy-Based Living Gift Shop!​

And whether you wear it or simply practice it...

May the good things in your life receive the honor they deserve.

PAUSE AND APPLAUSE!!

XOXO

Debbie Happy Cohen
Founder of Joy-Based Living