Joy...
Happy New Year!
My apologies for taking so long to get back to writing these snippets. Last year was one for many insights - some intense dips and many incredulous moments of love and light and learning too. I just couldn't bring myself to write much about it at the time...
My promise to myself this year (and you) is to Express more, so here I am.
Andy and I have had an awesome holiday at home. I've often though about holidays including sleeping and reading days on end... well, this year after Chrissy we did just that. It was magic!
I started and finished 2019 with the word Joy, and by reading "The Book of Joy" written by the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu (...it seemed relevant to read twice with life having provided a few zags when I thought we were zigging!!).
This book is a beautiful and insightful read, and though they are both spiritual leaders in their own right, each have had very different life experiences bringing them into their 9th decades. How similar at times and differing at others their views are. They came together for a week in friendship and laughter with the sole purpose of writing this book
- what an enriching experience this would have been.
One of the main points they both make is that if we seek Joy as a goal it often elude us.... though we may experience the greatest Joy when we are focusing on what we can do for someone else. This can take our focus and energy outside ourself - and in touching the heart of another it touches our own.
How relevant is this given our current situation in Australia with the drought and fires burning so much of our country right now... and how many people there are acting to protect and save another before even considering their own selves or property.
Tough times seem to crack us open. They are raw, real, and vulnerable. They are also filled with heart and spirit. What better time can there be to connect, and I know for me, I ponder much more what I can bring to it right now, even if this is a smile, hug or word of encouragement...
In searching for a new word this year nothing specific has come, so for now I will continue to hang with 'Joy'.
May your year be filled with light, love and spirit, whether life delivers you zigs or zags, or a bit of both.
Sometimes even zags can have quite a silver lining...
In Joy...
With love,
Pam
For those of you who are waiting.. I am happily back in clinic tomorrow...
