More inspiration in the kitchen...

Something happened to me yesterday. It was a moment that struck softly but penetrated through and through. Standing in my kitchen, smearing peanut butter across a slice of bread, I was suddenly awoken to the thought that I have everything I need to be blissfully happy in life. Not that this is a really new thought to me. I can't recount how many times I, even in the midst of my own battles with sorrow or frustration, have reminded my children that they in fact have all the wisdom, strength and love that they need for every circumstance right inside of them. Learning to plumb those depths is different from the initial knowledge. Blake's “universe in a grain of sand” seems still too unfathomable to claim as our very own...essence. And yet, this is exactly the sort of moment I had, not in my solitary meditations, but packing my kids lunches for school.
Happiness is a choice...not a striving choice, but a surrendering choice.
We cannot create happiness by amassing wealth or possessions. We cannot expect our family, spouses, children or friends to bring us happiness. Changed circumstances will not bring lasting happiness. Circumstances change, people fail us, and excessive possessions only create an increasing hunger for more. I am not asserting that these things cannot bring some sense of happiness, only that lasting joy and peace come from within yourself. From that wellspring is your soul's inheritance, God's eternal spirit in you. You come from joy.
But here I am writing about something that was just a nugget in my subconscious last week. I haven't stumbled on any thing new. Most of us just aren't living in the awareness of eternity. We get by day after day, going about our responsibilities with our minds wandering in yesterday or tomorrow or in any other place but here...and now. And yet we long for something more, something purposeful and fulfilling. Our vision is farsighted. We look right past the tip of our nose, reaching for something that seems more noble and lasting. But here is our blindness. Looking beyond, we miss those nearest us...those in our community, our street, our home.