Author: Susan Minarik

Every year, I forget how deeply the beauty of winter trees touches me. Instead, I only remember how unpleasant I find the cold. But here I stand, in the midst of all these trees, most bereft of their leaves now, and I’m caught in a spell of awe. I realize I don’t mind that the air is cold. And somewhere inside myself I quietly say, “I’m sorry. Please forgive me.”

I say it to my spirit. “I’m sorry that I let what I labeled as discomfort eclipse the memory of the astonishing beauty of bare trees. And just look how the frost on this fallen leaf glistens in the sun! Please forgive me,” I ask, “for overlooking such incredible gifts.”

Instantly, of course, I feel a shower of bright, warm, unconditional acceptance wash around me. It tastes golden, like joy, and my face spreads in a smile. I am humbled by it, and I whisper, “Thank you; I love you.”

All this because of the forms of the trees, naked against the clouds, and the shimmer of light on this leaf. But beauty isn’t the only thing that evokes my appreciation. Sometimes encountering truth will do it. Sometimes it’s goodness in one of its myriad forms.

I happened to notice my copy of Letting Everything Become Your Teacher again yesterday. It’s been sitting on my coffee table for weeks, unopened. Seeing the title is often reminder enough. Everything brings the gift of fresh lessons.

For me, the lesson brought by November’s bare trees and frosted leaves is to be aware that not everything I label as unpleasant is so. In this case, I could see that cold was just a sensation. I could call it brisk or crisp as well as bitter or biting. Then, having classified it, I could let it go and see what else there was to see.

Remember the game I told you about where for five minutes you let yourself notice whether you labeled things as either “pleasant” or “unpleasant?” (That’s all there is to it, in case you don’t recall it.) You just notice which way you’re judging things. Then you can use the secret power-question on yourself, asking yourself if your judgment is true.

You know what you’ll find? You’ll find that it’s only a judgment, whether you currently agree with it or not. Realizing that’s the case is good because it opens you to options. It keeps you from overlooking things by slapping a judgment on them too soon. Things change. Our perception of things changes. The world truly is a kaleidoscopic place, you know. Try to see what’s in front of you with an open mind. Keep a good helping of curiosity handy. It will wake you up if you’ve fallen asleep. It will say “What?! Look again!”

You never know when what you thought was a barren November landscape was in fact a scene of stark beauty, alive and dancing.

It could be. You never know.

Warmly,
Susan

Here’s my Halloween tale for you.

I was eight years old and in the third grade. I had a cousin who was three years older than me, a beautiful being, who took dance lessons. I inherited her costumes, to my great delight. This year, just before Halloween, she gave me a costume that had pale purple satin ribbons tightly curled in clumps on the bodice to look like a bouquet of grapes, and beneath it flared a stiff little skirt made of layers of netting the exact same color as the grapes. When I put it on, I felt like a princess. But my mother said I couldn’t wear it to school.

Instead, she built a pumpkin costume from chicken wire and orange crepe paper. She rigged my dad’s suspenders so the contraption would ride on my shoulders. It came with a crepe paper-covered paper plate for a hat with a green construction paper stem. It was embarrassing.. I didn’t want to be a big orange ball. It was far more wonderful to be a princess.

Mom and I negotiated until we reached a compromise. I could wear the grapes like underwear, beneath the pumpkin outfit. I could be a secret princess in a pumpkin disguise.. I wasn’t thrilled, but I agreed for the sake of peace. Besides, Mom’s argument that I would be cold wearing only the grapes made sense. I had to give her that one.

So off to school I went that Halloween morning snug in a sweater and slacks over the grapes and the pumpkin over that. Then the school bus came and to my immense humiliation I discovered that my pumpkin wouldn’t squeeze in the bus door. The driver came to help me. But then I couldn’t sit down. I had to stand all the way to school, holding the bar around the driver’s seat, right up front, and everybody snickering behind me.

When we got to the school, the driver helped me to the ground. And by then I had my plan made. The very first place we went when we got to school was the coat room, a great big walk-in closet with hooks on the walls in the back of the classroom. I took off that stupid orange pumpkin and set it in the corner, and the hat with it. I hung my sweater and slacks on my hook. And then, as if I were a beautiful butterfly, I danced to my seat.

The day was great fun. We had music and games and treats.

Mrs. Waltz helped me unfasten Dad’s suspenders from the pumpkin and said she would take care of it. She said to tell my mom that she was sorry it got so bent on the bus, but that it was a wonderful idea.

It was too cold, Mom was right, to wear the grapes trick-or-treating. She quickly fashioned a hobo outfit for me instead. And I was glad. It was warm. At school I got to play the trick of turning from a pumpkin into a princess. And now I got to go beg my neighbors for treats with my pals.

It was a wonderful Halloween.

Hope yours is today! Whether you play, or just watch and let go.

Warmly,
Susan

^{Image by Andreas Lischka from Pixabay}

Listen; I want to tell you something. Whether we have ever met in person, or talked together, or exchanged a few notes, even if you only linger here quietly, a name on my mailing list, whenever I think of you, I send you my love. I try to imagine who you are right now, what you might be doing, what it would be like to spend a couple hours together sharing stories.

One of the things I’ve discovered on my trek through the years is that people seem to play prominent parts in the theater of my mind. When I check in to see what I’m thinking, I often find that I’m having an excellent conversation with someone. I’ll hear her voice or his laugh, notice a characteristic gesture, feel what it feels like to be with that particular person, so different and distinct from all the others.

Even when we have never met in person, when all I have of someone, maybe you, is a name, maybe a few words and maybe a picture Even when someone exists only in memory now and some memories stretching back as far as childhood. Whatever the particular circumstances, I always swirl my love around them–around you, when you’re the one who has drifted into my thoughts. You, my fellow human being, are a significant part of my life. You provide the lessons and impart the meanings. You, my wondrous one-of-a-kind fellow human, are what gives life its most amazing flavor.

I think we’re all like that–that we all think about the people in our lives almost all the time. I think we all connect with each other like that. In our imaginations. Just because you are “only” imagining doesn’t mean what you’re experiencing isn’t real. Remember, we’re in a very mysterious place in wholly uncertain times. It’s a good thing if we hold each other in our minds, see each others’ smiles, dry each others’ tears, send claps on the back, wrap each other in encouraging and comforting hugs I think we strengthen each other when we do that–if “only” in our imaginations.

I just wanted to share that with you, send a batch of warm energy your way.

Pass it on, hey?

Smiling at you,
Susan

I was reading passages from Jon Kabat-Zinn’s Letting Everything Become Your Teacher: 100 Lessons in Mindfulness. I found it on a bookshelf accidentally a few days ago and brought it out where I could pick it up and read at random. You probably play that game, too—just letting yourself be led by the Unseen Hand.

One of the first times I opened the little book, I found myself reading Kabat-Zinn’s counsel on pain. So many of my dear ones are going through patches of pain right now that it seemed particularly relevant. We’re on rough ground here, all of us. Pain isn’t an abstract for anyone.

So the lesson I was reading, by happenstance, was about pain. He says not to expect pain to disappear, but to watch it go through its changes. It’s that “learning to surf” idea wrapped in different words. He tells you that the whole of it is the process of “watching and letting go, breath by breath, moment by moment.”

The world becomes such a kaleidoscopic place when you let yourself do that. You’re up to your eyeballs in it, just watching it float by, every moment full of everything, and oh! what music!

But to bring it back down to earth, there’s a lot of pain in our world right now, a lot of slings and arrows flying, and so many carrying their wounds. Be kind. Especially be kind to yourself and to the pain that you, personally and intimately, are carrying. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. Remember, everybody’s hauling around his very own bundle of pain. Everybody.

And everybody carries around an enormous capacity for joy as well. Joy! Really! Right there next to the pain, and every bit as real. (Life is such a bittersweet thing, isnt it?)

I think that when we’re making our way through rough patches it’s easy to forget about the reality and presence of joy. We get so focused on our pains that joy entirely escapes our awareness.

In fact, sometimes it’s been so long since we let ourselves feel any joy that we don’t even know if it’s possible. It is, though. Fact of life. It’s always there. It just takes a little while to see it sometimes. It’s sort of like when you walk from a very dark room into a brightly lit one. You might have to ease into it slowly. To feel the impact of joy, you might want to remember what gratitude feels like, or comfort, or even wonder and awe. Think of things that make you feel all soft and cozy. Slide from there into amazement and laughter and grins. Then just settle. Watch it and let it go. Watch it and let it go. Moment by moment. Breath by breath.

Peace, my friends.
Peace.

Warmly,
Susan

I could tell that the hummingbirds were getting ready to leave for warmer climes. One week they were at the feeder every time I glanced out my window. The next week, I hardly saw any. With a twinge of sadness, I silently bid my tiny friends farewell and wished them safe travels and a fine winter.

Days passed without my spotting a single visitor. But I left the feeder up in case a straggler stopped by for a final few sips before continuing on its long journey. You never know. Then, one afternoon when I was noticing the way a golden shaft of late afternoon sunlight was filtering through the woods that surround my home, suddenly a hummingbird appeared. For the longest moment it hovered upright, facing my window exactly in the center of the shaft of light, its iridescent body glowing and golden. I held my breath in wonder until it zipped away as quickly as it had come.

I have to confess that I thought it was telling me goodbye, and maybe its spectacular display was a thank you for the summer treats and a promise to return. I hope so. I’ll remember the sight of it when I look out a snowy window this winter at the empty shepherd’s hook where the feeder hangs from early April until I’m absolutely sure that the last tiny guest has departed for the year.

I keep a little treasure box in a corner of my mind to hold special memories of the beauty life on Earth offers. I plan to take it with me when I go. I have a favorite fantasy that in the afterlife we sometimes get to sit around a splendid bonfire with sentient beings from planets all over the universe swapping stories about what it was like on our home-worlds. Somebody asks me where I came from and when I say “Earth,” everybody gasps. “Earth!” they murmur; “Earth!” “Tell us, are all the stories true?” Our planet, it turns out, has quite a reputation.

“Well,” I answer smiling, “I’m not sure what you have heard. But it’s true that almost anything you can imagine has happened there–and then some.” Then I pull out my little treasure box and set it down in front of me. “What I would like to show you tonight is a bit of its wondrous beauty.”

What happens when you share around the campfire is that your stories appear as vivid, three-dimensional holograms, complete with textures and fragrances and sounds. It’s a wholly captivating experience. I show my new friends mountainous clouds and white sand beaches, flowered meadows and deep pine woods. I sneak in a few little movies of baby animals, and some of soaring eagles, and elephants and giant leaping whales. And when my presentation is about to come to a close, I pull out the memory that holds the little hummingbird, beating its translucent wings as it hovers in golden afternoon sunlight, offering its farewell.

I don’t know whether the afterlife holds such visits with our universe fellows, but I do know its wise to keep a treasure box of beautiful memories. You never know when sharing one or two of them might come in handy. Even if you’re pulling them out only for yourself on a cold, hard day when your heart needs a spark of warmth and your face needs a gentle smile.

May your treasure box be filled to overflowing and grow richer every day.

Warmly,
Susan

I^{mage by Pexels from Pixabay}

A few hours from now my dear 85-year-old neighbor Bob and I will step out of my car into a world from 50 years ago. The occasion is the annual Johnny Appleseed Festival in Lisbon, Ohio. We’ll walk past the vendors that line the little town’s streets selling foods and doodads, and arts and crafts. We’ll pose for pictures in front of the murals of Marilyn Monroe and of Fonzie and the Pink Cadillac that are painted on the brick wall next to the old railroad car diner, stopping to chat with the volunteer firemen next door who have their trucks on display.

When we get to the lot that hosts the carnival games and rides, we’ll get tickets for the Ferris Wheel and Bob will tell me about the time he and his wife took their Yorkie with them for a ride and how the dog thought that now he knew what it’s like to be a bird.

We’ll walk toward the old depot, admiring the dogs dressed up for the best costume contest, smiling at the teens in their hairdos and gowns, part of the Festival Queen’s retinue, and the Queen herself. A local band is playing country music on the stage and people are clapping and tapping their feet. At the end of their song, a lady comes up to the mike and says they’ll introduce us to the winners of the dog show.

Afterwards, we’ll get our traditional treat, a warm homemade apple dumpling with cinnamon sauce and a big scoop of vanilla ice cream. We’ll eat at the tables on the lawn of the Methodist church with its lovely gardens, and watch the people walk by. Then Bob will go talk with the ham radio guys and I’ll go look at the photography contest display.

We’ll meet back up, and go see the quilt show and marvel at the tiny stitches and the colorful, imaginative patterns. Then we’ll walk back to the car, watching out for the little train that carries riders around the town. The windows of all the stores have apple and pioneer day displays and taped-up coloring pages from the kids at the area grade school. The lawns and old houses, when we get to the edge of the town where we parked, are well-kept and boast the last of their gardens.

I savor the memories, thinking of it. I savor the anticipation of living it once again. It’s a good thing, savoring, a sure-fire sign that you’ve slipped into some delicious pool of joy. It’s such a versatile, thing,too. I really like that about it. You can savor an event from the past, or one that you’re looking forward to, or even this very moment right now. You just kind of sink into it, into its sounds and fragrances and textures and all, and let it live in your mind.

As you go through the coming week, pull some off the shelf and have a long, smooth taste of it. It’s good for whatever ails you. And if you’re lucky, it just might taste like apples.

Enjoy!

Warmly,
Susan

^{Image by lumix2004 from Pixabay}

In face of the fact that anything can happen–anything!–I maintain that it’s wise to keep a space open for the possibility that things could turn out great. A twist of fate could drop good fortune on your path at any moment. A turn of events you could change your whole life.

Not that it has to rush in full speed all at once. It could. But there’s no rule saying it has to go that way. Good times could start tiny, with a happy little surprise, and just keep gradually getting better and better from there.

I think we have no idea how very good it could get. But it seems to me it’s a smart idea to be aware that things could go that way, whatever the odds. Personally, I like to imagine that I’m living in a wondrously good and beautifully designed world right now. I consider it practice, so I’ll be ready in case things get amazingly good really soon. For all I know, the good stuff started seeping in a while ago, and it was so quiet I didn’t even notice.

I’ve observed that it’s easier for us to build disaster scenarios than boundless-miracle ones, but I attribute that to all the toxins we swim in and ingest. Garbage in –>Garbage out. You gotta pay attention to what movies you’re playing in your mind, and to where your ideas are coming from. It’s good to get really interested in that. And, you know, it’s good to get interested in what you’re putting in your body, too. Same principle. Being a Joy Warrior means relentlessly pursuing happiness. The deep kind. The real kind. The kind that reeks of gratitude and peace. And you don’t get there by wallowing in sad stories and gobbling up junk. You get there by looking around to see what goodness might be lurking in the moment’s secret places. Sometimes when you look, you see that goodness is right there in front of you. And what a fun revelation that is! It’s like waking from a dream into a fresh, clear new world.

Sometimes I like to think of life as my personal science lab where I do research and experiments. Either things go the way I predicted, or suspected, or hoped they would go (Hooray! Hooray!), or they don’t. I either succeed or I learn. So whatever way it goes, I win.

That doesn’t mean the experiments are necessarily painless. It turns out that sometimes you learn the most when things go terribly wrong. This is the real world. You can’t walk around with rose-colored glasses on and expect to get a true picture of things. You would be cheating yourself out of whole swaths of the human experience. And the human experience is a deep, rich thing–a privilege, a gift to you. Dare to see the whole spectrum of things. Every time you notice something that injures or harms, push yourself to see something positive that balances it,

I have this personal saying, “Every now and then a moment comes along that makes all of the rest of them worth it.” I call those “golden moments.” They’ve been coming with increasing frequency, I notice. I wish you a bundle of them.

Hold open the possibility open that miracles may appear at any time. Because, for each and every one of us, they may. Be prepared. Start practicing now. It could make all the difference.

Sending you happiness bubbles.

Warmly,
Susan

I know it feels painful to discover that reality differs significantly from the image you had of it. We get so invested in what we believe to be true. We forget altogether that our beliefs are just that, and that the information on which we’re basing them may have limitations we hadn’t considered.

I admit, it’s hard to get your bearings here, the way everything keeps shifting and sliding and all. The best that any of us can do is to do the best we can do, moment to moment to moment. It’s like the famous poster from the 1960’s where you see a yogi-like figure in long robes on a surfboard riding an enormous wave. Across the photo in bold white letters is printed, “You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf.”

The world is giving us surfing lessons big-time now. And it feels like high tide. It’s part of the adventure of being here. We get to live all the drama from inside it.

By the way, did you ever watch somebody learn to surf? It isn’t a pretty sight. Or graceful. Or smooth. They fall a lot. Sometimes they get injured. Sometimes they even get killed. That’s the kind of adventure we’re in. We risk death every moment. Threats surround us from our very first breath, from before that even.

But here’s the thing. Most who are learning to surf succeed. They get the hang of it, of the unpredictability of the ride. They get the rhythm and flow of unexpected curves. For some, it becomes a kind of dance or meditation. For some it’s a challenge of skills, a grand game. But you only rise to those levels to the degree that you let go of fear. Most of us are just paddling around as best we can, scared of dying, trying to get enough balance to stand. Our big glory is that when we fall, we climb back on, regardless of our fears and regrets. And these days, that can be one mean feat.

I love that about humans–the way we keep getting back on the board, working at making it work, even against all odds. Even when we have no idea why. God bless us all.

And God bless you, individually–you, who’s reading this letter right now. These are bewildering times. Balance doesn’t come easy for any of us. We’re riding on storm-tossed seas.

It’s okay to be afraid. Useless, but okay. It’s okay to be sad, or angry, or miserable. Just get back on the board and keep paddling. Eventually you’ll rock with the waves, rolling over their crests and into their valleys as if you were born to do it. Because, obviously, you were.

It doesn’t have to make sense. It might be a long while before we’re in calm seas. Life isn’t going to be what you had imagined it would be. But it’s still your life, your chance to ride the waves. Kinda wild, isn’t it? Kinda outrageous.

Just hold on, and rock and roll.

Warmly,
Susan

^{Image by Kanenori from Pixabay.com}