Good morning to you from Madrid, Spain. The first thing that came into my mind this morning when I woke up was I’m so happy, and I thought wow, what a great feeling. I’m at the home of my lifelong best friend Marion librarian. Marion Weger. We’ve been friends for over 45 years and I’m in her home where I have been coming for I don’t know- in this particular house – for at least 25 years. I’ve been in the same bed every time I come here for years and years. It’s very comforting to me on a very deep level and I’m very grateful for it.
Anyway, back to this idea feeling so happy. can count on my hand three or four different people who have said to me in the last seven days I’m so happy, which led to this conversation about acknowledging when we’re happy. Saying it out loud. Noticing it. When you are in that mindset, you start noticing other things that make you happy. I know there’s a lot of science behind keeping a gratitude journal because the more you pay attention to and acknowledge the things that you’re happy about or grateful for, the more evidence you see of things that make you happy or things you’re grateful for. I know that.
The other day I was talking on the podcast about waking up kind of on the wrong side of the bed and forcing myself to lie still and stay in bed until I got around to those thoughts about what I was grateful for. What made me so happy this morning was not only to be in a warm, comfortable bed, having had a good night’s sleep, but it’s also about being with Marian and having this time together.
Before I go on, I want to say thank you to the people that reached out to me to say happy Thanksgiving yesterday. It meant a lot. I was a little bit disconnected from the Thanksgiving fervor – from all of the good feels that you have on Thanksgiving day (or hopefully most of us have at some point during the day) I had just landed and I was jet lagged and a little bit off kilter yesterday, so thank you. I really appreciate it
What I want to talk about is that one of my dear friends reached out yesterday. Her message said it would be good if we could connect today, so I made a point of calling her back. She was telling me that she woke up grumpy, and she was going down the road of just kind of feeling sorry for herself yesterday morning. Her daughter wasn’t able to come home for Thanksgiving. Her boyfriend who was supposed to come ended up canceling last minute. What she wanted to share with me was that when she came out of her morning quiet practice – I believe she’s a meditator – her mind was flooded with all of these things that she felt good about. It was quiet. It was peaceful. She was warm. She had a wonderful Thanksgiving invitation. She was appreciating her new, rather simple home. She said to me when we got on the phone I wanted to share this with someone who I felt would really understand that feeling. When you come out of your morning quiet practice of simply being good right where you are.
We talked about that for a few minutes, but what really stuck with me was what happens when you shift from focusing on other and everything that’s outside of you that is going sideways. Sometimes it can be as simple as getting quiet with yourself whatever that looks like for you, whether it means turning on music that makes you happy, taking a nap, taking a bath, going for a run. It doesn’t matter what it is. It’s about taking a moment to shift from the outside focus. It’s that shift back to yourself, and turning down the volume on all of those thoughts about what’s going sideways or what’s irritating you to bringing it back to what it is that makes you feel good. It’s as simple as that sometimes.
I don’t know who might need to hear that today, but I’ll leave you with that.
Have a wonderful weekend. Until next time, from my heart to yours.
