No End Days
She was having one of those days - a day that
didn’t seem to end. She had overslept, which, of course, had thrown the entire
morning routine into a scene from a bad movie - lunches, coats and school bags were flying, not to mention the upset looks on the faces of her three daughters
as they departed for their classroom adventures. The rest of the day didn’t
fare much better either; it consisted of discontented clients, a conversation
with a very grumpy soccer coach about the holiday schedule of her youngest daughter’s
soccer game and an angry verbal exchange with the cable company, who had again increased
the monthly billing. All this would have been tolerable, she mused, if it was
only one of those days, but she had begun to realize that all of her days were
slowly transforming into ‘one of those days’.
As she sank into the drivers seat of her van
for the commute home on the always congested, and now snow covered, 401 highway,
she began the daily listing of grievances in her head about how she had survived
yet another stressful day of unsuccessful attempts at balancing her heavy
workload, the responsibilities of single parenthood, and the necessary
refinement of her character traits, which, after several outbursts throughout
the day, she knew needed emergency repair. She felt her frustration mounting as
she thought how, once again, her day had seemed to seize her rather than her seizing the day. She had not been able to think of any new ideas on how to
create a more peaceful home environment where she didn’t have to serve as the twenty-four hour unpaid moderator. No extra help had been provided at work, and she
could not think of how to accomplish any of the empowering resolutions she had
again made several months earlier when the New Year rang in. Her life, she
muttered to herself, had become one big rut and the more she pondered this
thought, the more her jaw tightened.
She knew something had to be done, but what?
She had been searching and searching for a remedy - for an escape from the
invisible barriers that seemed to block all her attempts to change her life
into the direction she wanted it to go. Due to her financial necessities, she
was not able to find a less demanding job that would allow her more time with
her children and more time for herself. She was at a loss for what she could do
to slow the pace of her life and relieve the stresses it included. She had
tried being more organized, more assertive, and more accepting but could not
seem to move forward and, quite to the contrary - as her resentment mounted,
her life seemed to move in reverse.
As she got out of her car and approached the
entrance to her home, she noticed a flyer on the ground from the local community church. Her eyes scanned the words written on it - “Be happy and you will grow”. What on earth did that mean, she thought.
She dropped the leaflet on the hall table and ignored it. It seemed so
obtuse, but the thought later boomeranged in her mind, as, exhausted and
frustrated, she faced the battle of the suppertime, homework, and bedtime
routines. ‘Be happy and you will
grow‘ she repeated to herself as she drew the children’s baths. ‘Be happy and
you will grow‘ she said while picking up the dirty laundry off the floor. ‘Be happy and you will
grow‘ she groaned the next day as she took on yet another seemingly impossible
assignment with a ridiculous deadline.
And then it hit her - her obstacles were actually the
remedy. The stumbling blocks to her growth - the static situation at work, the
unending grind, the monotonous peacemaking at home - were all there to teach
her that all she needed to do was to just seek happiness. Period. Not in
reliance as some artificial marker of success, but solely for the sake of
happiness, because happiness itself is growth. If she could be truly happy in
her present rut, if she cold see the good in it, then she could start to change
her life. Maybe she would never be on the cover of 'The Mother of the Year ‘
magazine but life could get better if she found happiness in her struggle. She began
to see the message clearly, but she wondered how she was supposed to find that happiness. Gradually she realized that the happiness would come from appreciation and so
she started counting her blessings and thinking positively for most of her day and spent only one hour of her day focussing on what she felt was lacking in her
life, both spiritually and mentally.
And so it began - she became thankful that the house was warm with
heat on a cold winter morning; that the children had beds to sleep in; that she
had a welcoming warm cup of coffee to start her day and that her fridge was
full of food. She was grateful
that she had a job and a van to drive to that job and when she got stuck in
traffic, she was now thankful that it offered her the time to reflect during
the long commute home. As the days progressed she realized that her life seemed
more manageable. She understood, of course, that she should always strive for improvement
but while struggling in those efforts she needed to take pleasure in her place in life or she
would never really sense accomplishment or blessings at all. She was finally
able to see that for all her soul- searching, the answer had been there all
along - she had simply overlooked it. But she didn’t regret that. In a way it
was fortunate that it took her that long to be thankful for the obvious,
because now she could really appreciate that all those days that wouldn’t seem
to end had actually been a very special gift.
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