Lately I’ve been focusing too much on what I don’t have rather than on what I do have which, when I stop for a moment to think about it, is a hell of a lot. I’ve been thinking about what I want that I havn’t got – a home of my own, a career I enjoy, money to do more – rather than wanting what I already have. Over the past 18 months I’ve cultivated love and interest in the simple pleasures of life but at times it’s felt like I’ve used them to build a flimsy wall against reality; inevitably, it got knocked down.
When this happened I felt crushed – all the bright things I’d hidden behind felt empty and worthless. After a couple of months of feeling wretched I began to feel an interest in the little things again, only second time around it was different. Rather than building up lots of little, separate moments and activities, like bits and pieces thrown into a drawer, I began learning to connect them all together. All the things I took pleasure in had become the lifestyle I wanted, gradually and without me noticing.
It’s hard to truly appreciate what we have in our lives that is good; it’s too easy to buy into the attitude that we always need something more or something different, that life now isn’t enough. Most people want things that they havn’t got; I want to learn to want what I’ve already got and to enjoy the time I have now rather than wishing it away for something better. Life isn’t perfect but I have so much that I should appreciate. One of the reasons I started this blog was to highlight all the simple pleasures to myself, to truly see them rather than letting them pass by, taken for granted. Every now and then I need to remind myself that they’re more than just little moments, small pursuits taken up to pass the time, because they’ve become part of who I am and of the life I enjoy now, not of a (potentially unattainable) future.
