I believe life doesn’t have to be beautiful.
And it certainly doesn’t have to be perfect.
Perfection is a myth.
Even the pursuit of perfection feels like a puffed-up, self-satisfied… “dust thrown in the eyes.”
What can far more successfully replace all this talk of beauty and perfection (blah-blah-blah) is simply a little charm.
Oh, God — how much charm and how many charming things there are in this world!
Pumpkin pie-scented candles, flowers with big dark-green leaves,
sunlight glinting off passing cars, sleeping children in large basket-strollers in supermarkets,
a spontaneous “Hello!” from a stranger.
And today in my house — the smell of oatmeal pancakes.
Even if you don’t want to eat them, you still want to breathe in that scent — oatmeal, milk, maple syrup…
What could be more charming than that?
Has milk ever attacked anyone?
Has oatmeal ever insulted anybody?
Have you heard of maple syrup ever striking or betraying someone?
It’s a miracle.
I’ve noticed: nothing much has changed in my world.
Except for one thing.
Polarity.
Where I once liked imagining the worst, inventing sad endings, and choosing suffering —
now something inside me naturally leans toward positive thinking
(ah, what a worn-out term!).
Stop.
I prefer the words “oatmeal,” “milk,” “maple syrup.”
Oatmeal.
Milk.
Maple syrup.
It is astonishingly simple to seek — and find — ways to be happy.
Far simpler than the alternative.