Finding Daily Joy & Daffodils

As I start this blog, I have had a zillion thoughts running through my mind... Family, faith, friends, raising a family, schooling children, cooking, scrap-booking, reading, empty nesting, decorating, medical issues & so much more!!! It is all swirling around and spiking at odd points in the day & middle of the night. What should this blog be about? It is time to quit procrastinating & dive in.

One night when I couldn't find a way to get comfortable & sleep, I started really considering this whole blog idea. I knew that I needed an outlet & a way to connect when I feel good & when I feel totally unconnected. I am part of an online group for those experiencing the effects of Cervical Spinal Stenosis. I realized as I read many of the posts & thought about so many other interactions with friends & family who suffer with chronic illness & pain or just the effects of living this life, that the one thing that is too often lost when we hit a wall, is the JOY in life. Suddenly everything is a burden & overwhelming. All the things that you not only should be doing, but also want to do are pushed to the wayside. Coping becomes the priority.

I am tired of only coping... I want to Find Joy Daily, Weekly, Monthly!

I want joy in my life. What? You didn't have ANY joy? Well, of course I did, but it is time to see things with new eyes. And my hope is that as I work to see the Light & share it with you, we can pay it forward.

Definition of Joy:   The emotion evoked by well-being, success, or good fortune or by the prospect of possessing what one desires.

My question to you this week: When did you last feel Joy?  

To get you started let me share a Joy from my life. The last couple of weeks seemed to be day after day of "coping". I decide to walk out in the backyard even though the ground was wet & I was bare foot. I walked carefully so as not to slip & fall (one of my big fears) on the slippery slime growing on part of the cement side walk. As I rounded the house & stepped into the moist green grass, my eyes fell upon a couple of determined daffodils. I say determined because these daffodils were not planted here.

Many, many years ago when my sweet babies were young, we had a beautiful huge pine tree in our front yard. (Note: I am calling it a pine, I can not for the life of me remember what kind it was, but it was big.) I planted rows of daffodils around this tree. It was such a blessing every February when it was cold & dreary out, I could look out my front window & see these beautiful daffodils. A hope of Spring to come.

A few years ago we finally had to make the BIG decision to cut down this tree. The roots were well under the house & were starting to bring up the walkway & heading to the driveway. We knew it would cost us more money to wait, so sadly the tree came down. We had the stump ground down to mulch & moved the mulch to the side of our back yard. I unfortunately had not stopped to think about digging up the bulbs to save them & so I was sure that they had been ground up & were gone as well. But surprise! The next February when I looked out my bedroom window, there they were, the Determined Daffodils.

I have found my life much like these daffodils, there are times when I am cut up & bruised, but I am determined to bloom wherever I am planted, even if that place is only on my couch for now.

Find your joy this week.