Remember when a little candy made you this happy?
In this season of new beginnings, look for the joy in your basket every day
It doesn’t take much to get you hyped on a holiday when you're a kid.
Looking at this throwback photo from Easter 2006, it’s clear that the Easter Bunny outdid himself, at least as far as my middle daughter Susannah was concerned. I can’t tell what’s in her hand that has her so over the moon. But it kind of makes you want to be 6 years old all over again, at least for a day, doesn’t it? Little Meredith and Cassie look pretty delighted too.
If there had been a way to bottle my kids’ pure, unadulterated glee, I surely would have. I should have bottled that butterflies-in-my-stomach feeling from my own childhood too.
We’d all be better off as adults if we still delighted in something every day.
It doesn’t have to be something big. For instance, I recently discovered the delights of Sun-Maid’s strawberry & vanilla yogurt-covered raisins. The prospect of those for an afternoon snack brings me joy. They only come in tiny little boxes like the ones parents tuck in lunchboxes, so it makes me feel like I’m in third grade again.
But maybe that’s the key to a happier life—to look for little things that bring you joy, the kinds of things that would delight a third-grader.
It doesn’t even have to be a thing. It could just be a thought or a little moment that made you happy–a compliment somebody gave you, a kindness you saw somebody do for somebody else, a meme that made you chuckle.
It’s easy to fall into the habit of cataloging what’s gone wrong on any given day. Or to dwell on all the little miseries that displease you. But while it’s easy to think that something’s always going wrong, don’t forget that on any given day, something is always going right too.
If you find yourself in a foul mood, try this little exercise: Reflect on your day from the beginning and catalog everything that went right, noticing the people and things you are grateful for. You’ll probably be surprised at how many things you list.
It’s not that things don’t go right for us; it’s that we train ourselves to notice what’s gone wrong. It’s human nature to focus on our problems because we want to fix things. And as you’ve probably noticed, the media is saturated with stories about what’s gone wrong. So we tend to do the same.
But why not train yourself to do the opposite–to become someone who notices what’s gone right on any given day?
After all, on any given day, it’s not like we haven’t received any little gifts; it’s more like we just haven’t bothered to notice the goodies that have been dropped into our baskets.
Here’s to noticing the bounty in your basket!
Author Richard Bolles says that seeking new employment offers us a chance to contemplate why we are here on earth and what our unique mission is. While Bolles speaks from a Christian perspective, he encourages the reader to translate the ideas he shares into a form that resonates with their own belief system.
Bolles cautions that figuring out what your mission in life is will likely take some time: “It is not a problem to be solved in a day and a night. It is a learning process that has steps to it, much like the process by which we all learned to eat.”
Bolles says to begin deciphering your unique mission by studying your talents and skills, and more particularly which ones (or one) you most rejoice to use. He says your mission is to take one step at a time, even when you don’t yet see where it all is leading, or what the Grand Plan is, or what your overall mission in life is.
According to Bolles, “I have learned that the secret of living is not to set as our goal a happy life, not even a successful life (as the world measures ‘success’), but a victorious life, meeting the obstacles and challenges that life naturally throws into our path, and by grit, determination, and grace, overcoming them all.”
In the olden days, moms used to clip newspaper articles for their kids if they thought it was something they needed to know. I’m watching for things you might have missed that may be helpful to you.
This week’s clips:
Behavioral scientist turned dating coach Logan Ury recently reminded her followers that sometimes your person hides in plain sight. She referenced a recent meta-study that discovered 66% of couples were friends for months or years before their relationship turned romantic. This article nicely explains the study’s findings that the friends-to-lovers pathway to romance is more common than people might think.
HR guru Patrick Lencioni says that finding the right job comes down to understanding your working geniuses, competencies, and frustrations. In this podcast episode, he discusses how to discover these and use them to nail your next job interview.
The resource site GenTwenty offers six tips to help busy young professionals better manage their time.
Today the sun came out and I got to take a pleasant walk with my granddog. Thanks for the reminder to be mindful of the little things each day that bring joy:)