I can’t always cure myself, of fear and sorrow and disappointment, let alone the world. But I can choose to live in joy, and I have.
I control so little of life outside of myself. I often feel like swimming in a river of harsh and jarring news and pain. Another school shooting, more floods, horrific bloodshed in Ukraine, and bitter division in my own country.
I’m not going to sink or swim in that river. I swim in my own.
A blog reader was incredulous when I said color lifted my soul. He just couldn’t believe it.
But it’s true for me.
I speak only for myself. I’m not a politician or world leader or prophet. It was Joseph Campbell who wrote that we can’t cure the world of sorrows but we can choose to live in joy.
“When you do things from your soul,” wrote the poet Rumi, “you feel a river moving in you, a joy.”
I feel that river, almost every day. I honor what I can do, not what I can’t do or control. There is always the possibility of sorrow. There is always the possibility of joy.
There is always a choice.
Thank you. I needed this today.
Reminds me of Abraham Lincoln’s quote: “Folks are about as happy as they make up their minds to be.” The same thing can be said about gratitude and joy.
Dancing together in life’s garden…
Kurt Vonnegut tells his wife he’s going out to buy an envelope:
“Oh, she says, well, you’re not a poor man. You know, why don’t you go online and buy a hundred envelopes and put them in the closet? And so I pretend not to hear her. And go out to get an envelope because I’m going to have a hell of a good time in the process of buying one envelope.
I meet a lot of people. And see some great looking babies. And a fire engine goes by. And I give them the thumbs up. And I’ll ask a woman what kind of dog that is. And, and I don’t know. The moral of the story is – we’re here on Earth to fart around.
And, of course, the computers will do us out of that. And what the computer people don’t realize, or they don’t care, is we’re dancing animals. You know, we love to move around. And it’s like we’re not supposed to dance at all anymore.”
Let’s all get up and move around a bit right now… or at least dance.
What lifts me up is music. I probably pay mor than I can really afford to get a channel with a wide selection o musical genres.
Georgann, this is wonderful! I’d never read that Vonnegut quote before. It truly embodies the ways I enjoy doing my rounds of local errands, making those little human connections wherever the opportunity pops up. Online shopping doesn’t provide any of that life-affirming experience, especially the positive and often surprised responses from the folks I talk to when “out and about”….complimenting the old gal with white hair on the purple streaks she boldly sports in it, telling someone I love the silly T-Shirt slogan/image they’re wearing, enthusing over people’s little kids and pets (behavior I learned from my gregarious mother – it just comes on impulse). Most people react with pleasure/surprise/enjoyment of being noticed positively. “We’re here on Earth to fart around” – LOVE that so much! Now, to head out for my weekly shopping and farting around… 😉