We fill New Year’s Day with resolutions. We set up plans for self improvement, ideas for what we could do
every day to make ourselves better and better. Forget them.
Too much happens to us and our loved ones that is out of our control to reach perfection. As for reaching a state of complete happiness, that’s not going to happen, either. There will always be something else that we think we need, new foods we want to try, places we want to go, something that could always be better or improved. And just as we’re about to reach our goal, a stupid little health issue pops up, or our best friend moves away, or someone dies.
Life is messy, Jen Pastiloff says, and she’s right. We’re never going to get all our ducks in a row because they get distracted and wander off.
Happiness is not getting everything we want, because we’re never going to get any taller. And if our belly bulge gets smaller, our butt gets bigger. Happiness is being satisfied with what this moment holds.
We notice what we have and make the most of it. Yet it’s hard to exist just in this moment without noticing what’s happening on the side, or thinking about an event in the past, or trying to anticipate what might be coming next and begin preparing for that, forgetting, of course, to live today. And then today is gone, and the week is gone, and then it’s a year later and we’re still preparing for the future, but we haven’t experienced any special moments at all.
Try an experiment and see how far you get — live an entire day moment by moment, being present to what you are feeling and to the people around you, staying with each moment until it ends, and THEN going on to the next moment. Would you make it to lunch?
Everything exists in this moment, all possibilities, but nothing becomes real until we acknowledge it.
If you go out on New Year’s Day (or any other day of the year), notice the people sitting in the restaurant by themselves, like the woman by herself staring out the window. She is eating her food but no one is across the table from her. A man at the bar is nursing his drink, but he’s not reacting to the football game on the TV over his head. It doesn’t look like he wants to return to a house that is no longer home.
Like us, they are wondering how they got here, and if they are doing with their lives what they wanted to do because reality isn’t matching their expectations. On this first day of the next year, we are feeling a mixture of longing, wistfulness, bitterness, anger, joy, happiness, compassion, and despair.
As I sit in the restaurant and listen, I realize that the holidays are hard on everyone who is struggling. Grief is only one of these struggles. Other people are dealing with breast cancer, kidney or knee problems, with lack of money, food, or housing, with disabilities or the creaking rust of old age. Some don’t know how they are going to make it through another year.
Across neighboring tables, strangers casually chat and discover mutual interests. I watch as couples laugh, enjoying their bonds. Some lean close and talk quietly. Others lean away and let distance fill the space between them.
Walking down the street, I watch how people smile and interact with others, or hide their eyes.
Life carries us, but sometimes, because of grief, we intentionally step off to the side and let life flow on without us. The longer we stand on the side watching life go by, the more settled we become living in the shadows.
After a time we don’t want to bother our friends any more with problems that don’t seem to want to end. So we stay home and shut them out. Yet our friends are waiting for us. They are hoping that we will let them listen to us talk about what is clenching our hearts so tightly that we can barely breathe.
If you are grieving and people have offered to come over, or if you are just feeling lonely and think that you would enjoy spending time with them, call them up. Tell them to come over.
Tell them you’re heating up water for tea.
Related Post
When Friends Visit http://widowersgrief.blogspot.com/2011/02/when-friends-visit.html
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