Are we missing it? In this rainy province, where we spend so much time eagerly anticipating the sun burning off clouds and rain to show how beautiful it is here, are we seeing it? With all this fear and dread and conversation of what the school year will bring, with the risk to FOOTBALL SEASON, an election looming large and seeming so important, even to us Canadians, with bills and job uncertainty pressing on us, it’s easy to see why we might be. We’re already wondering if any of this year can be salvaged and thinking about what happens to Thanksgiving and Christmas in these crazy times. Surely Santa is in that vulnerable age category and what the heck happens then?!
With this much going on, it’s easy to get caught up and I’m as guilty as anyone. And so with the beginning of a new month I’m committing to paying attention. This August is not going to pass me by and worry is not going to steal my summer joy. I might recommit to writing in my Gratitude Journal for the millionth time. I’m always committed to gratitude, but maybe putting the words on paper will bring about a heightened awareness of all that’s really good right now. (I usually give up on writing it all down because when I focus, I’m really good at gratitude. I start with my comfortable bed and pillows, the roof over my head, the fact that when I open my eyes I can see, I can walk to my kitchen, there is water in the tap, there is food in the fridge, my kids and grandkids are healthy, I have a job that pays the bills and all that is even before I get to the smell of the lavender on the sundeck, the blessings of faith, the texture of homemade bread, the sun in the sky, the mountains and the ocean, the freedoms we have in this country, my friendships……well, you get the idea. Writer’s cramp for sure). There is much to be happy about if we get clear about what it looks like to us.
I think one of the great thieves of joy is living beyond the moment or living in our worry about the future. It happens if we’re thinking of happiness as something out there that we’re working towards or something that happens when x, y and zed are worked out. Some elusive thing other people have found but is still hiding from us, so we’re looking and working for it the way we would for our dream job or soul mate. We spend a lot of time frustrated because we start to feel somehow undeserving or deprived of something that so many other people get to experience. (Cue the social media posts of everyone watching the fireworks while you work the night shift.) We get so focused on the sky everyone else is staring at that we maybe miss the kindness of a coworker, or the opportunity our job gives us to help someone or even just the fact that we’re employed and can look after our bills and families.
It’s easy to miss the beauty right outside the window if you think that everything worth seeing is around the next corner.
Along with that, another of the great heists of joy is our expectations. We tend to have expectations that our life will be like a Sunday drive that ends up at the ice cream shop when the reality is that ,most of the time, it’s like an obstacle course with snakes and bats. So if we show up in a dress and heels and have never worked out in our life, it’s going to SUCK. And if we are expecting our Rocky Road in a cone instead of beneath our wheels it’s going to feel jarring and disappointing.
But what if you show up expecting a challenging obstacle course? Maybe even looking forward to it. Then the snakes and the bats are still a concern but you’re fit, you’ve trained and you’re quite possibly competitive enough to be excited to prove you’ve got what it takes to conquer the course. It’s a mindset few of us have, at least consistently. And I’m not trying to say that life should always be a grind or that we shouldn’t expect to experience a little joy. Only that it might look different than what you think, and therefore not recognizable at first if you’re looking for what everyone else tells you it looks like. It might require some effort or adaptability. For instance, I know a number of kids who graduated this year. And they did not get the grad that the graduates of 2019 got. Or that the graduates of the last umpteen years have gotten. And it seemed like such a ripoff at first. No Prom, no ceremony, no fuss and palaver to commemorate and usher them into the next phase of their life. They were sad and we were sad for them. They already had the dresses and visions of what the experience would look and feel like. There was cancellation after cancellation. And it seemed like that was the way it was going to be except that parents, kids and educators said no damn way. They determined that grad was going to happen for these kids despite all the obstacles and they found innovative ways to create events to honor this right of passage. Ways that will go down in history books and will be talked about by other generations as they describe how they rose above the circumstances and created unique memories that the grads of 2020 won’t soon forget. It might not have been the way it’s always been done, but who says the way it’s always been done is the best or only way to do it. In fact, sometimes, doing things the way they always have been done becomes lazy and uninspired. And so creating something new isn’t a sorry substitute – it’s forging a new path that requires us to not be complacent and pedestrian. Life can make us dig deep and we can see that as difficult and negative or, we can enjoy the new muscles it requires us to develop and stand in the mirror and flex.
We need to stop buying the happiness bill of goods the world keeps selling us and the supposed fact that it can be delivered within 24 hours with no shipping and handling. It’s the surest way to be disappointed. If you think that happiness equals ease and that ease is your right, then things will always seem hard and a year like 2020 will rock you to your core. I heard a quote tonight by SHSU Baseball Coach Matt Deggs that made me laugh. He said, “There are two types of people in the world – those who are humble, and those who are about to be humbled”. And there is a similar quote by Woody Allen that says, “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans”. I am convinced that in January many of us submitted our blueprints to the heavens.
I really do believe that happiness is a choice and that it is tied securely to gratitude. That it isn’t dependent on a particular set of circumstances, that it isn’t promised and it is not attached to an easy life. It’s as simple as realizing that we’ve been given another August. The sun will shine, the ocean will sparkle, the mountains will look as spectacular as they always do when the clouds get out of the way. We’ll rise from our beds and possibly run an obstacle course while trying to keep the bats out of our hair. Or maybe we’ll go for a Sunday drive and end up at la Casa Gelato with 238 flavors to choose from. Children will run through the sprinkler, we might bake some bread and learn some new ways of doing things. Maybe we’ll change careers. We’ll build some new muscles, pick some flowers from the garden and look up at the full moon. We’ll see the people around our table and listen to them laugh and be grateful for their health and all the ways they buttress our life. We’ll sit in that glow and watch the sunset until it’s dark and cooling off and we will notice that we have fully lived another day.
Inside our ordinary house is a soft pillow and a fresh new journal page that will bear witness that it is enough.
Something to Shay 