The Joy Framework: Rediscovering the Things You Used to Love

💡 TLDR: Fun fact: In high school and college, I took cooking classes — and somewhere along the way, I lost the joy that once came so naturally with it. The personal story and framework to follow is about me finding my way back.

The first thing I remember is the smell of butter.

It clung to the air of the high school kitchen like a secret, wrapping itself around the hum of the ovens and the laughter of students who didn’t yet realize they were learning something far bigger than how to cook. My teacher — kind, patient, endlessly enthusiastic…moved through the room like a conductor, pulling joy out of each simmering pot and golden tray.

I remember the day we made pastries with phyllo dough. It was impossibly thin, almost translucent, and it was my first time even hearing of it. I brushed on melted butter and folded the layers slowly, afraid to tear them. It was a Greek pastry, though I couldn’t tell you which one now. What I do remember is how proud I felt when it came out of the oven, delicate and flaky, warm enough to fog up the glass.

Cooking, back then, wasn’t about recipes. It was about connection — sharing something you made with your own hands, swapping stories with classmates, and discovering how food could make strangers feel like family.

I ended up taking another cooking class in college. Picture: gumbo, veggie lasagna, more pastries, and for a brief moment, I was sure I wanted to explore going to culinary school. But I didn’t. I wanted the “traditional” college experience instead.

Funny enough, my first internship ended up being at a production company, where I worked with the executive producers of The Next Food Network Star and Chopped. So in a way, I still ended up around the topic of food, just not with it.

And for years, I didn’t think much about it. Cooking became something functional, something to check off the list. But lately, I’ve been finding my way back by buying cookbooks, trying new recipes, forcing myself to follow instructions again instead of improvising with whatever’s in the fridge.

I think what I missed wasn’t the act of cooking, it was the feeling of it. The creativity, the care, the sense of community that came with making something from scratch.

And that’s what this Substack is really about. Not food, but finding your way back to the things that make you feel like you.

Because somewhere between growing up and keeping up, a lot of us can relate to the feeling of forgetting about something that once sparked joy.

As adults, we trade curiosity for productivity.We stop doing things “just because.”

We convince ourselves that hobbies need to be monetized, that every skill needs to “make sense” for where we are in our careers. But the truth is, the things that lit us up when we were younger, the things we did before we worried about being good at them, are often clues to what fulfills us now.

You may not have time to draw, dance, sing, bake, or build like you used to.But you do have time to rediscover what those things gave you: connection, play, creation, exploration. And even if those things have shifted a bit as we’ve gotten older, I can almost bet the core of what brought the joy and the reason behind it remains true.

Here’s a small framework I’ve been playing with to find my way back to those glimmers of joy. The ones we lose track of when life starts moving fast.

Think back to what you loved doing before life got “serious.”Ask yourself:

How I do it: For me, cooking wasn’t just about food, it was about creating with my hands and connecting with people. The act of making something tangible felt grounding.

You might not return to the exact thing, but you can rediscover the essence of it.

It’s about evolving your joy, not replicating it.

How I do it: That’s looked like testing out a new recipe every week. It doesn’t have to be a production. Sometimes it’s just me, a playlist, and a glass of seltzer (I don’t drink much or else it’d be wine). But in those small moments, I feel that same spark I used to feel in my high school kitchen.

Start small. Add it into your week like a vitamin, not a task.Joy doesn’t return through force; it sneaks in through moments of curiosity.

Let it be messy, inconsistent, awkward even at first. You’re re-meeting an old friend.

How I do it: When I started cooking again, I made a deal with myself: one recipe a week. No expectations. No perfection. Sometimes its been amazing, sometimes its just okay, but it has reminded me that creativity lives in practice, not performance.

Notice how it feels when you engage with that old joy again.Journal it. Talk about it. Post about it. The act of reflection reinforces the connection.

You could even create a “joy tracker” — list your childhood interests and note where they show up in your adult life.

How I do it: Now, whenever I try something new, I snap a photo. Not for content (ok, maybe a little for content), but mainly for myself. It’s a small way of saying, “I did this.” Sometimes I share it on my Instagram stories, sometimes I just scroll back through my camera roll and notice the patterns: the color, the care, the effort. It’s proof that joy can be rebuilt.

We don’t outgrow joy. We just forget how to access it, and where it all started.

Sometimes, growing up doesn’t have to be about becoming someone new. It can be about remembering the version of you who was brave enough to try, to create, to play.

You don’t need to go back in time, just find a way back to yourself.

Try this:What’s something you used to love that you’d like to find your way back to?

I’ll go first: If you made it this far, thanks. By now you know that it’s cooking, and this week I’m making enchiladas for the first time. 👩🏽‍🍳

More soon,Millie