~ A Joy Warrior's Journey
Here’s where the deer lie,
sheltered by sycamores,
cooled by the green leaves
of tall, wild sunflowers,
the sun filtering down
to kiss their pelts with warmth.
This is the place they dream of
in winter, the place they sing of
in lullabies to newborn fawns
in early spring as they lick
their soft hair and promise
them tomorrows filled
with flowers and sunshine.
The creek is still today,
its transparent surface mirroring
the lush growth along its banks,
capturing the clouds and the sky
as if to reflect back to them
their beauty. I stand in late summer’s
tall green peering into the creek’s
shadowed water, lucky enough to spot
brown fishes lazing among the rocks.
Some scenes are almost too perfect
to bear. And to stand in their midst,
tasting the fragrances, the breathing
of it washing against my skin,
is to feel honored somehow,
and blessed to be alive, here, beside
a still creek that mirrors the sky.
An unfamiliar quiet hangs over the lake today,
a kind of waiting for the high-pitched shouts
and laughter that danced over its waves
on every sunny day since June.
The children are gone, carried
from their homes just after sunrise
in bright yellow buses to the county’s schools.
The kids, I imagine, were filled with excitement,
glad for something new at last,
for reunion with old friends,
for moving once again toward grown-up.
But here at the lake, it’s awfully quiet.
I walk its shores and whisper to its waves,
“I know. I know.”
You never know when you set out
what your journey will bring.
Anything you can imagine
is possible, and then some.
It’s all a gift, you know,
a chance for you to explore
your choices, to decide who
you will be, to discover what
you’re made of. Hold on to your hat.
Hold on to your dreams. This gift’s
an adventure, you know.
Keep faith,and always remember
that everything passes, and light
always shines at the end of the road.
Acres of golden sunflowers,
more than you could count in a day,
nodded in the afternoon sun,
each head, heavy with seeds, bowed
as if in gratitude for the joy
of such productive lives.
Overhead, in a deep blue sky, floated
a single cloud, looking like an angel
with outspread gauzy wings, come to bless them.
And a warm breeze, as light as feathers,
wafted across the broad field,
whispering its quiet amen.
Remember when I invited you to measure your happiness quotient at the start of July?
How are you doing so far? Take a quick inventory and find out.
If you want to up your supply, one of the best things you can learn from genuinely happy people is to keep your options open.
You might think you’re limited by your age, responsibilities, circumstances, finances, or health, but the truth is you have countless options for expanding your happiness every single day.
The trick is to keep an eye out for them, and to risk grabbing the ones that wink at you as they appear.
One choice that happy people make is the choice to be free to try something new, even if it might make them look or feel silly, even if it violates their “shoulds,” even if it’s not “realistic” (and maybe especially if it’s not).
They ask themselves “What if?” and “Why not?”
They hone their curiosity.
They’re not locked in by plans, or by fears.
They’re flexible and daring.
They’re more driven by exploring life’s offerings and possibilities than by toeing the line in order to achieve an imagined security or success.
They trust life enough to let the conclusions take care of themselves.
Hunting for Happiness
Sometimes the something new starts with a new viewpoint, with asking, “How else can I look at this?” or “What opportunities are here?” or “How can I turn this into an adventure, or make it interesting or fun?”
Happy people cultivate a sense of play.
They teach themselves to see what they were viewing as a limitation as a challenge to their creativity instead.
For happy people, life is an art form, and they are the artists.
Dancer and choreographer Agnes de Mille said, “Living is a form of not being sure, not knowing what’s next or how. The moment you know how, you begin to die a little. The artist never entirely knows. We guess. We may be wrong, but we take leap after leap in the dark.”
Happy people don’t expect all their choices to turn out well. But they expect to grow from each of them, to learn, to be enriched by all that they experience.
They know that the joy is in the journey, in taking the leaps.
Taking the Risk
Looking for options keeps us from living on auto-pilot.
It opens a view of possibilities, moment to moment to moment.
Asking “What are my choices?” keeps us aware and alive.
Refuse to accept the lie that you have no choice.
You always do.
Happy people teach themselves to look outside the box, to deviate from their routines.
They learn to risk letting go of preconceived notions and of caring what anyone else thinks about the choices they make for themselves.
I have a poster on my wall that says, “Trust Your Crazy Ideas.” I think that’s great advice.
Crazy ideas can turn out to be the start of learning a whole new skill, or of meeting new people and making new friends.
They can lead to the discovery of a talent you hadn’t known you possessed, of discovering treasures and wonders you had no idea were right around that next corner.
Happiness experts Foster and Hicks say “Every new day presents the potential for relationships, education, personal growth, professional development and just plain fun.”
What calls you? What crazy new idea could you try?
What if?
Why not?
Keep on the lookout for new options—moment after moment, day after day.
They’re in front of you right now.
Next week I’ll share with you one of my favorite keys to increased happiness, one of the most beautiful ones. Stay tuned!
Warmly,
Susan
Image by Mohamed Hassan from Pixabay
In days of sunshine and those
of trial, whether by happenstance
or choice, life sends us the gift
of companions for our journey,
spirits to walk beside us, to share
our laughter and our tears,
our stories and our silences.
Some stay only for moments.
Some come, then go, then reappear.
Some walk beside us for long miles,
for lifetimes, and maybe more.
Love, after all, never dies.
And it is love that sends them,
these companions, that each of us
may know that we are truly
never alone.
I fell asleep last night
with a parade of flowers
ribboning through my mind—
the spring’s first crocuses
at its start, the tulips, the lilacs
the irises, peonies, and roses.
When I woke, I sighed, sad
that the parade would soon
be at its end. But then the day
brought mums, a little love note
smiling at me from the grocer’s door,
as if to reassure me the dance
isn’t over quite yet.
So subtly August turns us from summer to fall,
sliding the sun from its zenith, inching
the pool of night onto closer shores
almost without notice, as if it were a dream.
There on the hill, the first blush of crimson
creeps onto the maple leaves. The young geese
grow restless as their first migration nears.
The tillers of the land start the rituals of harvest.
Fragrances we haven’t known for a year drift
from kitchen doorways, smelling like home.
And we who dreamed summer would stretch on
find that it’s changed now, its green losing its sheen.
Oh, so subtly August turns us. So deftly she ushers us on.
The woods completely dissolve
the idea that peace and stillness
are the same thing, that serenity
is motionless and silent. The trees
say peace is an endless singing
of possibilities brought into being,
then gone, a rise and fall of notes
echoing through the edgeless
vastness, transcending time.
And serenity is the embrace
of the song, the welcoming
of it, the joyous recognition
that it is the Yes dancing,
within and without,
without end.