Happiness comes very easily when I’m able to Do.
But what’s tricky about that is that I am often not able to Do.
And so how does one try to increase their ‘pockets of joy’ when their body is unable to do little more than the essential functions. There’s no crafting, or colouring, or reading, or listening to audiobooks, or film watching, or baking…
I look to others for a lot of my happiness during these times.
Photos of walks that my Dad has taken me on via the wonder of WhatsApp are a lovely way to raise a smile.
Hearing that a friend’s little one has their first tooth coming through. (The best messages I receive aren’t ones that ask me how I am, but ones that tell me snippets of my friends’ lives. Just a sentence or two about their day, as mundane as it may seem to them.)
Trinkets taken from nature for me to see and hold; conkers, acorns, leaves. The perks of being an Arborist’s wife?
And sometimes when I come to jot my Three Good Things down every evening, it can simply be that I slept through the previous night that warrants a smile. Or a particular symptom having eased off at some point during the day. (It can sometimes feel like clutching a straws but it’s a good practice for me to have I think).
When I am able to Do and get out into nature myself, for example, I take photos for my friends so that they can share in it too. Just as they do for me when I need to live vicariously through them.
So that’s what I’m doing today; sharing with you incase you’re in need of a bit of joy and are needing to get in in someone else’s joy. I wobbled into the garden for 5 whole minutes of freezing fresh air over the weekend and I saw frost for myself, for the first time in a very long time.
On Tuesdays via Instagram stories I sometimes ask you to share something lovely from life lately. It’s never to pretend that things are fine and dandy when they absolutely aren’t; it’s about sharing something that made you smile or content and hoping that by sharing it someone else might get a smile out of it too.
M.E. myself and I 