It Ain't Rainin' No More

Honestly, I feel like I've just been through some weird, dark storm and have come out the other side, where it is sunny and warm, a world full of goodness and light. 

The unfortunate thing is that I think I caused the storm myself.

Let me see if I can explain.  As you probably noticed if you've been reading this blog, I was really getting into a rut of feeling like, "Oh, look at me, I'm so busy, aren't I great to be pulling all this off, but I'm so stressed, wah."  Not only was it a rut, but I was getting addicted to it.  I wasn't stopping to say hello to people I liked, or to hug my kids in the morning, or to read books--one of my favorite things to do.  I was acting primarily out of a sense of "duty" or "responsibility" (yikes!).  And I was really starting to get convinced that my self-worth lay in all that busy-ness, that I was great because I was pulling off so much, or keeping it together so well, or whatever little stories I was telling myself.

You know how in The Devil Wears Prada that main character--the what's her name main girl--is always saying, "I didn't have a choice!"  Oh, no, I missed your birthday because I had to work, I didn't have a choice, oh, no, I'm taking a crap on all my friends because I had to do such-and-such, I didn't have a choice.  Well, it's sort of lame to learn your life lessons from the movies, but what the heck.  It's a good lesson.  I've been making choices left and right and pretending as if I was a little delicate leaf, being tossed by the wind.

Well, NO MORE, FRIENDS!  I am no longer the delicate leaf!  Take my delicate leaf and shove it up your whatsit! 

Really, what I'm trying to say, is that I am going to make some different choices.  I am going to slow down and say hello to you in the hall at work.  I'm going to stay up a little later to read that book.  I'm not going to finish grading all of my papers every once in a while in favor of hanging out with my husband and my kids.  I'm not going to focus on feeling sick, tired, or pissed.  I am welcoming in abundance and prosperity and happiness.  And my life is full of goodness.  Real, true, honest-to-goodness goodness.  And I am going to choose to notice, experience, appreciate, and grow that goodness.

Like, isn't ghirardelli chocolate just one of the best things ever?  And how about the song "Fireflies" by Bishop Allen?  It makes me cry it's so beautiful.  And the way Nolie screeches and cackles every morning when she wakes up to her dad and me, grabbing big fistfuls of our cheeks and hair?  Or Addie, whispering, "Mama, you'll always be in my heart," when I dropped her off at school today?  Or having faith in the utter persistence and fundamental goodness of my fellow humans?  Of the amazing friends and family the universe has blessed me with?

Well, I could go on and on.  My gratitude over-floweth. 

A student of mine has been emailing me, expressing his despair about global climate change, and his fellow students who refuse to believe it is happening, and his fears for the future of human life.  He is truly, truly afraid.  And I know that fear--I know how scared and out of control and angry he feels. 

But I won't share his fear and rage this week.  Instead, I will extend my energy and belief toward growing solutions, toward faith in him and his generation.  I'm going to tend my own garden some, and spread that love as best I can.  Harmony, harmony, harmony.  That's the mantra.

 

Oh, weird.  I just went to rip the stormy picture above from Google, and of course, my "affirmation of the day" reads "I have provided a harmonious place for myself and those I love."  Must be on the right path.