Photo by Johannes Plenio on Unsplash

I’ve always tried to make Catching Happiness an escape from the chaos and suffering we see around us in the world, and a small oasis of peace and joy. I find it encouraging that there are always bright spots of happiness, hope, and dreams to be found if we only look for them. Here are a few that I’ve found lately.

Author and illustrator Susan Branch shares many simple pleasures and everyday adventures on her blog. She and her husband have relocated and downsized from their home in Martha’s Vineyard to California, and I’ve enjoyed reading about her adjustments to, plans, and dreams for their new home.  “Summer Dreams” is her most recent post. 

“Hope in Difficult Times,” Action for Happiness podcast. There were many encouraging takeaways in this episode, so if you only click on one link, make it this one. 

In “How to Become Enchanted by Life,” Leo Babauta notes that we often turn magic into the mundane and offers suggestions for how to reverse that tendency. 

For science-backed tips to improve your happiness habits, check out “Eight Ways to Stay Happier This Year, According to Science.”

Find more tips for boosting happiness here. 

I’m not the only one who comes back from travel inspired. Stephanie reflects on lessons learned from a dream trip to Italy in “Maybe the Hobby Lobby Sign Was Right.”

This doesn’t surprise me at all.

I might be spending way too much time watching the Big Bear Eagle Live Nest Cam, which features bald eagle pair Jackie and Shadow—and their three tiny eaglets!

What bright spots have you discovered lately?

Photo by Alex Shute on Unsplash

“We never know what’s ahead. Hope isn’t the white paint we use to mask our suffering. It’s an investment in curiosity. A recognition that if we give up now, we’ll never get to see what happens next….

“To ask how hope is possible in the face of dire realities is to confuse hope with idealism. Idealism is when you expect that everything in life is going to be fair or good or easy. It’s a defense mechanism, just like denial or delusion.

“Honey, don’t cover garlic with chocolate. It doesn’t taste good. Likewise, there’s no freedom in denying reality, or trying to cloak it in something sweet. Hope isn’t a distraction from darkness. It’s a confrontation with darkness.”

— Edith Eger, The Gift: 12 Lessons to Save Your Life

But Men Must Work and Women Must Weep, 1883 by Walter Langley,  Photo by Birmingham Museums Trust on Unsplash

“‘Art is the highest form of hope,’ said painter Gerhard Richter. But hope is not about knowing how things will turn out—it is moving forward in the face of uncertainty. It’s a way of dealing with uncertainty. ‘Hope is an embrace of the unknown and the unknowable,’ writes Rebecca Solnit. To have hope, you must acknowledge that you don’t know everything and you don’t know what’s going to happen. That’s the only way to keep going and the only way to keep making art: to be open to possibility and allow yourself to be changed.” 

—Austin Kleon, Keep Going

Photo by Johannes Plenio on Unsplash

“Hope isn’t the same thing as happiness. You don’t need to be happy to be hopeful. You need instead to accept the unknowability of the future, and that there are versions of that future that could be better than the current one. Hope, in its simplest form, is the acceptance of possibility.

“The acceptance that if we are suddenly lost in a forest, there will be a way through.”

—Matt Haig, The Comfort Book

Early yesterday morning I pulled out my planner/calendar and a small stack of embellishments—stickers, washi tape, etc. Snuggled up in my bed, sipping coffee with Luna sleeping next to me, I decorated my month-at-a-glance pages for March and April, choosing inspirational, encouraging words as well as colorful stickers and tape. After that, I decorated my weekly spreads for the month of March. I spent probably 45 minutes to an hour of my precious early morning quiet time matching colors, and looking for words that will gently encourage or inspire.

Why is this significant?

Because I haven’t wanted to do this, or indeed even felt able to, for almost a year. Why bother, when I wasn’t going anywhere except the grocery store or the barn? Even though I still used my daily planner, I didn’t care what it looked like. When the to-dos on my list never varied from the mundane daily “keep us alive” chores week after week, I didn’t have the mental energy to make my pages pretty.

Just like snowdrops and crocus are harbingers of the spring season, my desire to pretty things up in my planner indicates to me that something is stirring in the frozen wasteland of my psyche! Could a spring thaw be coming?!

While I was playing in my planner, flipping through sheets of stickers with inspirational words, matching washi tape to my weekly to-do list, I felt a little current of happiness flowing through me. A gathering of energy, even a flicker of creativity—things that have been sorely lacking lately.

Even though I’m still essentially going no place that isn’t necessary, I feel the slightest tickle of, could that be…hope? That I will—we will—be able to enjoy life a bit more soon. When I’ll be able to write “coffee with ______” on my pages, when the exhortation of “wake up and be awesome” won’t make me want to hide under the covers (my stickers are ambitious).

Even though my pages are still mostly blank, surely they will begin to fill up soon? Maybe with a visit to an outdoor market before it gets too hot? Maybe even with “plan trip to California”? I need to start penciling in things to look forward to!

It’s such a small thing, this desire to decorate my daily calendar. But I hope it’s the start of something positive.

When you’ve been down, what small thing(s) demonstrate to you that you’re feeling better?

—Epicurus