Books can be a Blessing

One of life's challenges is to find the small blessings that pepper our lives every day. Some days it's hard to do so. And on other days they are so obvious that you can't help but trip over them. The real blessing, is to learn to be present enough in your life to know that blessings are there in spite of the chaos, and to seek them.

As I've written before, words of wisdom can pop off the page when you least expect them to, and that's the small blessing that comes from reading. Martha Woodroof's Small Blessings  came along just when I needed it in my life, and that's the nature of blessings. This novel is filled (SPOILER ALERT) with people who are struggling with addiction and mental illness, either their own or someone's that they care for. Most importantly it is a book about how people gain insight into their true selves.

Everyone has something that they hide or try to run from. As a result of the discomfort, fear, shame, (you add your own emotion here) many seek to ease the pain using drugs, alcohol, sex, shopping, overeating, busyness (add your addiction here). Two-thirds of the way through the book (page 207 to be exact), two characters are discussing their unusual childhoods when one states they wouldn't have swapped with anyone else, "Because then I would have been living someone else's life and not my own." To which the other person replied, "It's sort of like we each get our own adventure, isn't it?" And there is the lesson - accepting one's life, accepting one's adventure, accepting one's own identity. It is when we try to run from ourselves that we run right into trouble. Haven't I done the same time and time again. I needed to be reminded that it's time to stop running. It's time to learn acceptance. It's time to practice the wisdom of the Serenity Prayer - accept the things I cannot change, find the courage to change the things that I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. It's the last part that's the real kicker.

French Lessons?

Watercolor palette and brushes

There are many times when a particular phrase carries so much meaning in the original language but cannot be translated completely into another, hence the phrase "lost in translation." Yet while reading Marjorie Price A Gift from Brittany  I perfectly understood the words spoken by an old French peasant woman "tu vas connaitre la misère (You will come to know misery)." Of course it helped to have been brought up with Canadian French relatives who still spoke the language and two years of high school French. Then again life has taught me the understanding of the phrase as well.

"Perhaps there was wisdom in expecting misery to be a part of life, in accepting the fact we can't evade it. Trying to deny it only makes it more devastating, more lethal, so that when something tragic happens, we are unprepared and cut done by it." (p. 228, Gotham Books New York) How true is this quote! Life is a mixture of good and bad. It is not all one thing or the other. In fact even when you think you are surrounded by misery there are still pockets of joy, you simply have to look for them and recognize them for what they are because sometimes they are the tiniest of things - a smile from a stranger, a parking spot close to the hospital entrance, a person who is willing to serve you even though their shift has ended, a gentle touch. Often when our lives are filled with misery we are unable to see beyond it, we forget that good is even possible. On the flip side when times are good we forget the bad. Living is about learning to know both the good and the bad. To embrace all that life brings. Yes, embracing the bad seems crazy but it carries lessons that need to be learned. Plus if we do not experience the bad we cannot come to truly appreciate the good that life brings.