To Be Content
The full Jane Austen quote reads, “I must learn to be content with being happier than I deserve.” For me lately, I feel as though I am simply learning to be content. What does that even mean? I think we are so pressured to not settle, set goals, grind, and keep going that we forget contentment along the way. At least I have.
I have been in the in-between again lately. I think Fall is a good season for that. Between harvesting, letting go, and moving into hibernation. But, can I be content with letting go? I am not sure yet.
A friend and I read a book a while ago. A book to which we both threw against the wall. I am not even entirely sure we finished it. It was The Book of Forgiving, by Desmond Tutu and Mpho Tutu. Forgiveness, humanity, letting go, and contentment is probably all tethered together isn’t it?
So, how do we let go when things didn’t go according to plan? When we are betrayed, abandoned, hurt, isolated, and in some sort of life detour we never imagined. Or we are left to make decisions that either way make our hearts ache. And yet, not letting go, not forgiving, doesn’t allow for contentment in your life.
I’m curious. I really don’t have the answer. None of us do. It’s a journey to figure it out along the way. For me now, it is wanting to embrace this beautiful chapter. Steep in presence. The joy of now. Perhaps to do that I have to release the ghosts. The ghosts of plan A, B, C, D, hell, even plan Q. I am beyond the alphabet. I want to enjoy the now though, be content in what is unfolding. I do not wish to be tethered to what was or what will never be. If we stay attached to something that doesn’t exist, where does it leave us?
My entire life I think I have held on too tightly, maybe it is just the way I am built. I hold on to moments, to people, to my own inner turmoil. All of which, has usually externally disappeared. I just like to tuck it in right beneath my spleen or kidneys for safe keeping. You know, incase I need to pull out some suffering at a moment’s notice. But at this point in my life, I wish to let go. I wish to soften amidst the world’s upheaval and pain. I wish to allow joy in with open arms. It’s not to dismiss the hard, because bypassing it never helps. However, it is to embrace it all. Embrace what is here and now. Things I can have a say over and honor that which I can’t. That is probably the lesson at the end of The Book of Forgiving isn’t it? Damn Desmond.
I am in a new chapter, so I have to let go of the old ones. Let go of the ghosts that keep me tethered by a very fine string to a life that I am not living. To honor it all and know that it is okay that it didn’t go according to my plan because the universe had a better one in mind. It is okay to be content with being happier than I deserve.
Stay well out there.
Let’s rise,
ah