I am lucky enough to have a trusted professional to speak with regularly. Dr. P is about my age and she has great experience. I mentioned in my last post that my friend Bev is encouraging me to write, and now Dr. P is also. I told her that as I watch YouTube I find myself hoping to discover someone in my stage of life who discusses multiple topics–not just makeup, or clothes, or a specific illness, or even health, but a variety of the things I find interesting, and the types of things I struggle with. I’d like to feel less alone and more inspired.
Not that I am without companionship. I am happily married, I still have three teenage children living at home, and a twenty-year-old who just moved back home to finish college online. I have friends but they are still busy with their careers or good health. I do not want to join a group; my energy and health are still too up and down to commit. So I watch YouTube and period dramas, and news. The latter is very divisive so I won’t get into that. I get things done around the house in bits, and struggle with the fact that I am so seriously less productive than ever before.
Someone I’ve recently heard about and watched on YouTube is a Harvard Business Professor named Arthur Brooks. Perhaps you know of him. He has lectured and spoken throughout the United States (and maybe the world), not about Business, per se, but about Happiness. The tie-in is that in order to be an effective leader and to have satisfied employees, one needs to know about the keys to happiness. Gratitude is essential.
Taking a tip from him I have instituted a practice of not just making a list of what I am grateful for, but very specifically choosing five things per day and really meditating on them, ideally as I walk. With the frigid temps these days I may not walk every day but whether I do or not, I spend some mindful time on five things. Three are supposed to be obviously good things, and two must be borne from suffering. Suffering? Yes. And for each, one meditates on three specific aspects of that gratitude.
So for example, today my obviously positive things were: 1) our family went out to dinner after church yesterday and I was grateful for the laughter, the precious time with family, and the means to do this (wow, dinner for six at a nice restaurant is pricey these days–we won’t do this regularly); 2) just the fact that I was out walking, I was grateful for the sun on my face, that my back could handle it, and that I could walk independently when there are others who have lost the ability to do so; 3) for my two new kittens, that Bruce allowed me to get them even though he pays for it and usually takes pets to the vet for me, that they are sweet and purr and are quite therapeutic, and that they are hilarious to watch.
The suffering-related things were: 1) I still have pain in multiple places every day, but the pain has drawn me closer to God, has allowed me to see how much Bruce truly loves me, and actually has pushed me to exercise more consistently; 2) my face was literally freezing in the bitter wind at that moment, but that discomfort forced me to think back to the many winters with frigid temperatures when despite them we got out and rode horses (the memories precious like gold) and I remembered riding a ski lift happily in Colorado high above the ground in the wind when the temperature was recorded as 18 degrees below zero (Fahrenheit!), and finally that I was grateful to be one step closer to home, and another, and another.
On other days I have had more profound thoughts regarding suffering, but those above were appropriate to share. A few years ago I created a post in which I later regretted sharing too much, and I do not want to that again; so, if you consider reading any more of my blog posts in the future, I promise–nothing awkward. Dr. P said if I don’t want to create a YouTube channel with the content I would want to see (I do not) then consider writing about it. A sixty-something-year-old taking some of Arthur Brooks’ advice is my first post. I will continue to learn about whatever else he suggests, and I may write more on it; however, there will be other topics. I am happy to hear your suggestions.
It feels good to write again. Thank you for reading!
Suzy Cornflakes 