Grab your coat and get your hat because we are headed to the sunny side of the street. The past few years have presented a lot of acute changes and obstacles for us all. The way that we communicate, love, and experience joy was colored by variables, like the global pandemic, that was very much out of our control. If we wanted to, and many of us did, we could sit right there and wrap ourselves in a cocoon of despair. It was our party and we could cry if we wanted to.
It was a foreign idea that the control was still in our hands. Despite all of the external forces we still had the power over our thoughts and subsequently our lives. It is not turning a blind eye to the realities and hardships of life. There are griefs in life that can weigh heavy on our hearts. It is making the active choice to find the most beautiful, nurturing, and joyful options and walking down that sunny street as often as possible.
So much of corporate culture champions streamlining operations as the path to success. Optimizing for the greatest return on your investment. So often this is synonymous with maximizing the financial benefits. But we all know that money does not buy happiness. That the more money we accumulate is not directly proportional to living a beautiful and happy life. Shifting our mindset of what our investment means. Our time, our days, our lives are the real investment. Finding the choices that give us the most joyful abundance of our investment is a much different mindset. It is the difference between spreading yourself so thin by trying to do everything humanly possible and choosing the components that are necessary for you to find joy and pleasure every day.
This is an exercise in creative problem-solving. Considering what needs to happen every day. Jobs that need to be done, meals that need to be made, laundry that needs to be folded, and well chores that need to be done. How could you do these in the most wonderful way possible? Can you take a long walk in the fresh air while on that 2-hour conference call? Can you cultivate a few recipes that you love and come together quickly? Can you listen to a great book or podcast or playlist while doing household chores? Yes, you folded the laundry and cleaned the toilet -- but you also finished a great book or danced to Beyonce's new album. This shifts the story of your day. Yes, it was filled with chores and long meetings but it was a walk in the sunshine and an enrichment of your soul.
Consider the story of your day. You have the power to write your own story. It is how we pen those decisions that ink our reality. It is not turning a blind eye to the realities of life but taking back the power of how you craft the only thing we can control - our reaction. Take some time to consider how you could paint a rosy hue to your day-to-day. How can you still tick off those to-dos in the most beautiful way possible? Make one nurturing choice, then another, and rewrite the story of your day through those choices.