Finding Joy In The Little Treasures In Life

I used to say it was the fame I needed, then it was the money, then more of it and even more. Then I needed every little thing that they considered luxuries. I got the plane, the yacht, even a private island. I did the travel around the world thing.. let me tell you, that was great, I cant deny that. This place really is a wonder. It’s really about finding joy in the little treasures in life.

Everyone should sink into a white sand beach in Tahiti or the Caribbean islands sipping a mojito out of a coconut without a worry in the world. Or climb a mountain and feel that liberating feeling of being on top of the world. Oh, and everyone should take a helicopter ride overlooking something as beautiful as the Grand Canyon, The Rockies, or even over blue waters. It really puts into perspective how damn lucky we really are to have the privilege to live on a planet so beautiful, so magnifying.  

It gives us so much as we return the favor with pollution, war, hazardous waste, discrimination, and malious. As well as the insidious decline of human decency in general. We are good at destroying each other and ourselves.  

Its unfortunate what little things lead people to misunderstand each other. We all see a different picture, hear a different song but some people have a harder time coming to terms with that. My biggest concern used to be that people would misunderstand me. Now I know, we are all infected by our own misunderstanding of how our minds work. Also that the relationships with the ones we love involves a peculiar combination of understanding and misunderstanding.  

I can say though, I can’t fully make sense of when someone has a misunderstanding of the beauty of life. “If a man cannot understand the beauty of life it is probably because life has never understood the beauty in him.”  

I do truly understand how the pitfalls and misfortunes that come to all of us could prove a meaningless life at times but it is the shortness of life that inclines me to find meaning in the meaningless.  

Like I’ve mentioned, I’ve done it all. Or at least the “all” that the majority presume is what is needed to measure “success” or “fufillment” but I can tell ya, that those things were not by any means what brought me to the eternal state of happiness I hold now.  

It’s the small treasures we find without their origin. I love to enjoy life by the littlest of things. Getting lost in a deep conversation, feeling the hot sun on my skin on a beautiful summer day with the birds chirping, people laughing and hanging out on their front porches. Taking a deep breath of fresh air, feeling the grass or sand between my toes, watching the trees sway in the wind, when the lightning strikes through the space like sky or the loud sound of rain drops on the tin roof atop my porch deck.  

Just this morning I found such joy in waking up, making my coffee and admiring the fresh fruit sitting in a crystal clear bowl on my kitchen island. I don’t know why but it is the little things like that that bring me real joy. The birds taking flight from one tree to the next, a mothers inmate love for her child. A father playing ball with his son at the park, or scorning him when hes wrong, teaching him to be a man. Going for a long walk through nature is one of my favorite sources of joy. It helps me stay connected with where I came from. Also watching my children grow up has given me ongoing sense of fulfillment and satisfaction.  

Just the feeling itself of being alive, the amazing fact that we are here right now, thinking, doing, being. Isn’t that enough? 

I say it is not the material luxuries that brought me joy and it’s true, but it is also true that I am proud of what I was able to accomplish in this life. I did everything a man at my age, 56, would like to accomplish. That was great, but my life now, is better. I realised what I needed and it wasn’t what I had. It’s about finding joy in the little treasures in life.

Now, all I need is my little house out in the country overlooking a small lake. My deck that wraps around the house, the beauty of the nature I get to experience every day, my books, my tea and once and a while a beer or two because who doesn’t like a cold beer on a hot summer day? The hot sun on my skin and hot summer nights where the crickets are out the toads are croaking and everything just seems right. As if I am exactly where I am supposed to be. And somehow I know I am because the feeling of wholeness and contentedness that I’ve been searching for for years, has finally caught up to me. I couldn’t imagine feeling anymore on top of the world as I do now. I’m finally feeling what it feels like to be alive, and man did I fall in love real quick.