A wild ride!


This picture is an outtake from my sister's engagement photos.  It strikes me as funny and a little bit of a foreshadowing of what marriage is like.  It's sometimes a wild ride!  What seems like it will be our "happily ever after" very quickly becomes real life with real ups and downs.

Sometimes we think that if we don't feel happy all of the time, we must being doing something wrong.  We mentally beat ourselves up for getting frustrated.  We try to avoid boredom by scrolling for something interesting on our phones. We feel a low sense of self worth, so we eat some ice cream to make us feel better.  We do anything we can think of to try to ignore or brush over those bothersome negative emotions.

Now don't get me wrong... I am NOT a proponent of wallowing! I believe staying "stuck" in negative feelings is not useful, and not the way to live our best lives.  But when we tell ourselves that we should be happy all of the time, we are setting ourselves up for frustration and failure.  Life just doesn't work that way.

And ironically, as soon as we are willing to accept the negative, it actually becomes less of a problem.

My married daughter was over for dinner on Valentine's day.  I had tried to plan a special dinner, but it turned out nothing like I had envisioned.  I was disappointed and a little frustrated at all the chaos going on around me that seemed to be ruining my plans.  My daughter said "Mom, it's a little surprising to me that you still get frustrated, even though you have all of these life coaching tools.  It actually makes me feel a little better!"

I assured her that my life, just like everybody else's, is full of ups and downs.  Life is meant to be a bit of a wild ride!  The lows we experience help us to more fully appreciate the highs.  Having experienced darkness makes the light so much more meaningful.  The secret to rich and fulfilling life is to learn to allow and embrace it all.

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