Welcome to the New Year! Is this year everything you dreamed it would be? Perhaps only a few days in, it has held up its end of the bargain yet. But if challenging moments haven’t found you yet, likely they will be coming at some point. So often, we feel like making it to the calendar flip will mean that things will get better. Maybe that can be encouraging, but often, I think it decreases our ability to enjoy our life now. I also believe that always thinking in terms of good and bad years can be a real downer. If that is the way I have to organize my time, well, I have had a lot of bad years. However, I have had a lot of good moments within those bad years, and I think that I shouldn’t forget those excellent days because I am stuck thinking in terms of years.

This year was a challenging year for me. Unrelated to my acoustic neuroma diagnosis, I had many health issues and four surgeries in twelve months. Because new issues kept cropping up successively after I had dealt with the previous problem, I realized I needed to change my mindset.

Historically, I have easily gotten caught up spending too much of my time waiting for the upcoming bright spot in the calendar. I will power through hard times by holding onto the thought that right around the corner, things will get better. Yes, today is hard, but that upcoming vacation, or quieter season, or easier work month, etc, will make life so much better. However, in a year where things just keep going awry, that sort of thinking isn’t helpful. The corner that I needed to turn never came. So, I had to figure out a different way to hope.

In the middle of this challenging time, I decided I was done waiting for life to get better. I no longer wanted to waste these large tracts of my life. I wanted to make the most of my time and find the good moments where they were. For me, time is too precious to throw it away. I chose to start searching for ways I could enjoy life even if I had to modify it for my current health situation.

Now, I am in no way wanting to minimize anyone’s struggles, including my own. Some moments are just plain terrible, no matter what your mindset. Life can be so hard some days.  Situations like surgical recovery can mean many days of slogging through pain and retraining your body. I also do not mean to imply that there isn’t a time and a place for working to improve your life. Sometimes you need to put in the hard labor to get important things back to your life.

I have just found that keeping my perspective a little more near sighted helps me find the good on more days than when I look far into the future. Sometimes, looking too far forward can be daunting and overwhelming. Or it can feel impossible to ever get to the future goal. I can waste time spiraling through how much is wrong or needs to be fixed when I focus too forward.

Instead, I try focus on what I can do– maybe today I can enjoy a cup of coffee on my patio and read, maybe tomorrow I will be up for a walk, and next week I can take a bicycle ride. I assess where life is at and how I can work within my current life parameters to meet both my productive and my joyful goals. Obviously, some days, any goals at all are a stretch. But I try to remember that both taking care of my body and my recreation needs are as important as handling work and responsibilities like housework. I attempt to not fixate on what I can’t do or have today and instead appreciate what I do have and what I can accomplish. I celebrate the small steps I am taking that move my life in the direction I want.

If this sounds like mindfulness to you, well, it is. Mindfulness is all about staying present. Thoughts are one way to achieve that. There are other tools that work well for mindfulness, such as: breathing techniques, yoga, journaling, and meditation. This article has some great ideas on mindfulness practices and ways to get started. https://tischbraintumorcenter.duke.edu/blog/mindfulness-techniques-brain-tumor-patients-and-caregivers

Since I have started working on my perspective, I have found my mood and emotions more stable. I can tell I feel more content and less frustrated. In the midst of an extremely challenging year, I have created many memories of joy and fun.

So perhaps you want to join me in finding good moments. Like me, you appreciate a gorgeous sunset. Maybe you enjoy an especially delicious supper (bonus points if someone else makes it). You can join me in feeling thankful for being well enough to exercise today (even if it’s just a simple walk). We can both remember to take photos of the beauty we find as we go about our day (all the photos in this blog post are happy moment pictures I have taken throughout this last hard year). While acknowledging the struggles and the places life needs to improve, we can celebrate what is delightful about right now.