In this episode of the CJ Moneyway Johnson Show, host Corwin CJ Moneyway Johnson interviews Joy G, a former WWE Diva, actress, model, fitness trainer, and current spiritual mentor, medium, author, and podcaster. Joy shares her Boston upbringing, early motherhood, and her drive to learn holistic health to care for her children, leading to fitness training and massage therapy. She recounts her path into acting, becoming a SAG‑registered actor, and landing a spot in WWE’s Diva Search, describing the audition process, life on the road, and interactions with wrestling stars like The Rock and The Big Show. Joy reflects on the challenges of being taken seriously as an entertainer and how that experience shaped her identity. She explains that mediumship arrived organically after her entertainment career, guiding her back to wellness and spiritual work. Throughout, she emphasizes mentorship, creative expression, and the continuity of her artistic drive now channeled into writing, podcasting, and teaching. The conversation highlights the evolution from physical performance to spiritual guidance, illustrating how varied life chapters inform her current mission to help others.
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What's up, my good people? Welcome to the CJ Moneyway Johnson Show, the podcast that brings you stories behind the success. Today we have on the show author, healer, spiritual teacher, and mentor Joy G. How you doing, Joy?
I'm great. How are you doing, CJ?
I'm doing good. Thank you for coming on the show today.
Thank you. I'm honored to be here.
So Joy, tell us a little bit about yourself and about your background.
My goodness. Well, these days most of my work is as a medium, connecting people and giving clear guidance and messages either from their loved ones that have crossed over or about things going on in their own lives. But that's not where I started. I grew up in Boston, kind of city girl, if you will. And eventually, through— as life takes you, ended up doing you know, moving to California, doing some acting. I was probably best known for my role as a WWE Diva, which was an amazing journey in itself. And then when that career ended, I always had a passion for wellness. I had actually trained and was a massage therapist and a trainer and all kinds of things before my acting career. So I kind of got led back into that and mediumship sort of came to me. I didn't really seek it out. It just, You know, as life goes, sometimes things just happen and, and you keep going down the path. And here I am, you know, 10, 15 years later, uh, getting to do what I love. I'm pretty lucky.
Yeah, yeah, that sounds like an amazing journey, you know, exciting journey. So since you was talking about this, tell us about your time being a WWE diva and your time in modeling and acting. What was that experience like?
I really loved it. I, I was kind of in a place in my life— I already had my kids. I became a mom young. Uh, I— my kids are grown now, so I was 20 when I had my first one. Uh, and I had already been doing, like I said, fitness training. I was training as a holistic medicine practitioner because I wanted to help my kids. I realized once I had kids that I didn't know very much at all. And, you know, they, they're babies and they get these little tummy aches, and you don't take them to the doctor for every little thing. And I was like, I need to learn some extra tools. So I started training in that, and I was training, uh, as like a fitness trainer for primarily golfers and athletes and things like that. And then I ended up— the mentor that I was working with— I believe in mentors, I gotta tell you, CJ. Find someone that knows more than you and, and ask them to teach you. And that, that mentor was like, why don't we start training you for like fitness competitions and things? And I ended up not getting all the way to fitness competition just because my frame is a little small. But, I ended up doing some modeling and really loved it. I actually had done a little bit of acting when I was in kind of, you know, school plays and a little bit in college and really loved it. But, where I'm from in Boston, it's kind of the attitude of like, "Well, that's not a real career. You got to pick something else." So, I kind of put that dream to the side and was auditioning. I actually was fortunate enough to have become a SAG actor. So, I was I was really out there trying to do it and put my heart and soul into it. And then the WWE thing was just an audition that I got. It's kind of a funny story and just goes to show, I guess, you never know what's going to be the thing that opens the door for you. My kids were very small at the time. My agent had called me for this audition. I had recently declined a couple of auditions, like within the last couple weeks. And just, I think one of my kids had like a little cold or something. And this audition was far. I lived maybe an hour and a half outside of LA at the time, so I was commuting. And this, this audition was all the way on the other side of LAX, which was going to be like, like 2 hours away. And I just was like, oh, if I don't go on this, I'm gonna— my agent's gonna drop me. And it's really hard to get agents. So I went, um, I ended up getting picked up for— they had a— I think they called it the Diva Search back in the day. I think it might have been the first one, actually. It's so hard to remember now, it's been a long time. Um, and then from there I ended up working with the company, and for about year was the catalyst of their main event program. So I was getting kidnapped and put in trunks of cars and fought over and chased down dirty hallways in the back of arenas and got to travel the world. And it was pretty— it was, it was an interesting time. It was— I actually wasn't sure if I wanted to do it initially, just because the truth is, at that time, if you remember back, this is like early 2000s, maybe 2005, 2006, there wasn't crossover happening. Like, if you were doing that, no one was ever taking you serious as an actor. It was, it was pretty much The Rock, and even he was kind of being not super mainstream at that time. It was like, oh, he's that wrestler guy. And I just was like, no one's gonna ever take me seriously again. I don't want to be seen as just a physical— my physical self, you know what I mean? So I, I kind of fought whether I was going to do it or not. And my team at the time that I was working with, they were like, listen, this is international exposure. Do you want to work or don't you? And so, you know, you got to take sense from people who know better. So, so yeah, I worked for them for about a year.
So that's pretty cool. So you, so you was actually hanging out with The Rock back in the time before The Rock was The Rock?
Uh, no, he was already The Rock. Don't, don't get that wrong.
Don't get that twisted. I get it. I get that too.
But I did get to meet him and work with him a few times actually. I always had a big crush on him. So my, uh, quote-unquote boyfriend or special friend on the show was The Big Show. So he was the big guy at the time, uh, and doing the main event fights and, and all of that. Usually the main event for the night, like the main title fight, was something happened to me and that's why they had to fight. So yeah, it was kind of the way it worked. It was an interesting thing for sure.
I bet it was. So let me ask you on, on the question that you was— something that you was saying, like you said you got into acting and you went into it fully and, uh, things of that nature. So let me ask, yeah, did that— so say like, okay, you was doing that back then, so do you think that that have something to do with like the things that you're doing now as far as your podcast, uh, writing books and things of that nature? Like that creativity that was always there and now, you know what I'm saying, it's, it's exposing and it's coming out. Because I can remember You know, coming up, I was one of them kids too, you know, dancing, putting on performances for the holidays. That's when they had a show called— they had a show, Putting on the Hits, or something where they was performing and things of that nature.
