learn the secret of being content in any situation

I really am thankful that I get to stay at home instead of getting up every morning and having to bundle myself and kids off to school/daycare. I love that I am here to see all of Sophia’s “firsts” and be here when Whitney gets home. I am struggling with being content with that being “all” there is for me. I don’t even know what more I want. I just want to be content with my life as it is.

There’s always some new electronic/book/game/movie/CD/toy/widget that I want to add to my collection. What would it be like to suck it up and learn the secret of being content (Philippians 4)? I’m not starving, I just want more junk. Imagine what I could do with my life if I didn’t spend my time/money/talents just trying to acquire more stuff for myself!

This would be very helpfull as to i also always want change and to be doing new things and be meeting new people.

I am stuck. I really don’t know what to write. What I feel right now is I have lost all hope in life. Although I am aware that I can still go on, my hopelessness still prevails. I just want to lay down. Still. Untouched. Unmoved. Just like this, forever. I don;t want to take another step forward because that is all I’ve been doing eversince I learned how to feel like this. I am not pleading for help or whatsoever. I know that life is easy and there are others who are experiencing more drama. I hate not being content and I hate how I am aware of how to fix my problem.

I just want to be happy where I am right now. I always want change in my life and am tired of running. I want to learn to just enjoy life as it comes and quit making life more and more complicated.

“He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have.”
Socrates

“Someone asked Junayd: “Slave of God who yet are free, tell me how to reach a state of contentment.” Junayd replied: “When one has learned through love to accept.”
Al-Junayd

I was sitting here today, and it hit me. I am content now. Perfectly. No matter what happens in the next few years, I’m going to end up going somewhere I want to go. It’s not even a question anymore, it’s just a matter-of-fact kinda thing. I am going to be happy, and content, and it’s starting tonight.

So, on our way to a family vacation in Yosemite, we stopped at a rest stop to pee and feed the baby. Kristin was nursing in the car in a fairly sparsly populated lot as I walked back from the bathroom. One of those extended-cab pickup trucks had parked right next to us (there was no shortage of empty lot; I think cars have a certain gravity that compels them to park in clumps), which wouldn’t have really mattered except that the driver had left the engine running when he went for his own pee. It was a diesel and spewing foulness all around us; Kristin, nursing, had the windows open, as it was a hot day.

There were three or four adults left in the truck. (As an aside, what’s the point of an extended-cab pickup truck? You can’t really haul anything in it…) As Kristin staggered out of the smoke with an upset, interrupted baby, I mimed “turning off the ignition” to the woman in the passenger seat, who shook her head and rolled down her window. I went around to her side and asked politely (honestly, I’m a pretty courteous guy) if she wouldn’t mind turning off her engine, since we had a baby in the car.

“We do, too,” she snarled, gesturing at a car seat in the back and rolling up the window half way. I could feel a blast of Legionnaire’s-disease-cold-air coming out that gap, and I couldn’t help hoping that they’d bundled their poor infant pretty well as I explained that their exhaust fumes were making it difficult for us to breathe, nevermind what might do to our baby.

“I don’t care,” she said and rolled the window the rest of the way up. I thought of all sorts of comebacks—Christian charity came to mind, since they had a crucifix dangling from the rearview, or even a simple “Well, I never!” But I couldn’t, of course, because the window was closed.

I did not feel content, not at all. I felt plain old angry, the more so because the peeing driver returned and they drove off. Could the baby not stand an a/c interruption of five minutes? With the windows up, would they even have noticed a temperature change? (To his credit, the driver seemed to realize the situation when he returned and, with his eyes, at least, seemed to apologize for not having realized we were next to him. I suppose I should pity that, whoever he is - husband, brother, father - he will be with that woman on the passenger seat for at least some fraction of his whole life, and I got out of it after five minutes.)

I keep coming back to this incident in my mind, though, and wondering where I went wrong. I certainly wasn’t content then.

I’m cheered, though, that writing this has made me feel more content now. A bit after the fact, perhaps, but content.

Misery is almost always the result of thinking. (Joseph Joubert)

My advice to you is not to inquire why or whither, but just enjoy your ice cream while it’s on your plate. (Thornton Wilder)

I definitely over analyze things. MUST STOP.

Plan A:
1. Focus on ME and not on someone else and what they are doing to piss me off or disappoint me.
2. Get on with my life and do my own thing despite what “he’s” doing
3. Look out for Numero Uno
4. Implement Zen meditation (see photo, above)

If all else fails, implement Plan B:
1. Immediately go get a pedicure and a manicure. Read trashy magazine during pedicure. (Yes this is a mandatory element of Plan B)
2. Go to Dairy Queen and get large blizzard in flavor of choice. Devour in car on way home. (This takes practice to do while driving especially with a fresh manicure)
3. Open bottle of wine and pour into glass (or tumbler for that matter)
4. Run hot bath tub with yummy-smelling bubble bath
5. Quickly drink half the glass of wine and re-fill
6. Immerse self in bath (place glass of wine within reach)
7. Soak until pruney

Aaaaahhhhh!!!