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Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.
Ecclesiastes 12:13
For me, being Christian, my clarity comes back to this verse. It is an anchor of focus for me. The point for me is to serve God and to strive for deeper understanding of exactly what that means to serve God. So, I guess it could be said that instead of happiness I strive for enlightenment and better practice of my understanding. I think, in general, happiness is and will be a byproduct of that, but not always. Sometimes life is just hard.
In difficult times I try to focus on what I should be learning. Sometimes I have to learn to be still and be patient. Sometimes there’s a hard lesson to be learned (or more often in my case, re-learned!). Letting go of control, or the illusion of control, seems to be a reoccurring theme with me.
I try to remind myself to be gentle with myself during those times, much like how I try to be with my children when they are having frustrations with new skills or information. Rather than being dismissive of my frustration, I acknowledging that this moment sucks, I let myself have the negative moment. Then I let the moment pass and move on from it.
In trying times I remind myself that I must keep my focus and trust that something new is being learned. Transition is hard, but lean into process and trust that clarity will come. I have been taught this lesson over and over again, but alas, as the saying goes, easier said than done.
