The Opportunities We Miss to Gladden Ourselves

“It was such an important lesson for me to be aware of my thoughts, especially my dark thoughts because when I’m in that space, that space of negativity, anger, and worry, that I miss, in equal proportion, opportunities to gladden myself, to make myself happy.”

Last month I was having a trying day. A couple of technological challenges were getting the better of me and I decided to take a breather, get outside and go for a walk. I remember telling myself before I went outside to leave my worries behind and just enjoy the walk.

I am fortunate to live in a part of the city that offers parkland immediately surrounding my condominium building—beautiful trees, grassy areas, and even a waterway to walk along. There was certainly plenty to appreciate around me.

But on this day, not even the splendor of the great outdoors was enough to pull me away from the mindless ratatouilles of past thoughts still ravaging my mind. I was still stuck in the past and worrying about my perceived technological problems. I walked along the streets looking at the beauty around me, but not really seeing it. My worry had a strangle hold on me and didn’t want to let go!

As I walked along in my befuddled state of mind, I passed a taxi cab stopped on the side of the street. As I walked past the taxi, there was an abrupt and startling knocking against the backseat window, coming from inside the car. Obviously something or someone in the backseat was knocking quite violently against the backseat window. I noticed the car windows were darkly tinted, so I could not see anyone inside. But I could clearly hear the sound of banging on the window and could even see the window vibrating and moving outwards as it was struck. Even with ALL the startling commotion, my worries still had the better of me and I walked on by the parked taxi, seemingly unaffected by the unfolding events, lost in my thoughts of ‘how am I going to solve this problem!?’

When I was about 20 feet past the car, I heard a loud voice yell out to me… “ROBERT!!!”

I spun around and there, climbing out of the car, was a colleague I had not seen in almost a decade. She yelled again… “ROBERT!!!”…and ran toward me with open arms. We gave each other a big hug and over the next 10 minutes shared with each other what we had been doing with our lives over the past decade and exchanged contact information with the intention of following up to arrange a coffee to get better caught up on life.

After our brief meeting my colleague went on her way, as she was enroute to an appointment when she spotted me, and I continued my walk back toward home. I didn’t walk more than a few steps and realized my entire energy had shifted and I was feeling much more relaxed, much less consumed by the worries of earlier that day that resulted in my getting out for my walk.

I stopped for a moment and sat down on park bench as a flood of realization came upon me that I almost missed that amazing encounter with my colleague because I was so lost in my worry. It took a loud jolt to shift me out of my worry. Until then, I was completely oblivious to the beauty around me. Until then, I was missing a world of opportunities to gladden myself, to make myself happy.

It was such an important lesson for me to be aware of my thoughts, especially my dark thoughts because when I’m in that space, that space of negativity, anger, and worry, that I miss, in equal proportion, opportunities to gladden myself, to make myself happy.