Really Feeling it.

I read recently an explanation of why we (humans) seem so much more impacted by negative events than positive ones.  Thinking of the primitive human:  Failure to be alert to the sabertooth tiger stalking you?  This can kill you.  Noticing the beautiful sunrise? Appreciating a complement from your hunting partner?  These feel nice, but confer no survival impact.  So apparently humans are by now hard-wired to pay much more attention to the negative/dangerous things.

Fast forward.

No sabertooth tigers in my neighborhood.  Yet still, if neighbor A has failed to say hello when passing me on the street, followed by effusive greetings from neighbors B and C and D?    I find myself fretting about A, while barely remembering the others.  The survival advantage in this setting is much less clear, to say the least.

Working from that train of thought, I've decided it makes sense for me to purposefully target good stuff in my life with extra attention.  Some people keep Gratitude Journals, which is one way of approaching this.  And I considered it.  But for me, saying thank you has a component of "I'm glad you gave me something I really don't deserve".  Which probably reflects my warped reality rather than making any real sense-  but nevertheless, the idea of a gratitude journal wasn't working for me.

What I really wanted was to notice the delightful things that happen in my day, from one of my dogs thumping his tail against the floor when he sees me coming to opening a medical journal to see one of my articles in print, to...(fill in your delights here).

Then it struck me:  I will pay attention to what delights me each day.  A Delight List.  So here goes with yesterday's delight.  Yesterday, Day #100, was certainly a momentous day for me.  Yet I started, in my mind, to downplay its significance.  And caught myself:  Whoa, Carrie:  Pause and Enjoy!

I stopped on the way home from work and bought a small fancy cake to celebrate, which daughter and I enjoyed.  And I found this, on arriving home (From Mister, who works in a city about 5 hours away)

I'd already purchased some irises for myself-  they were my Grandmother Olive's favorite flower!  And Mister sent the beautiful multi-colored roses!  You can't really tell in this photo, but the red glass vase is shaped like a large heart.

This all makes my heart sing, and I am delighting in it!

And here's why this is important in a Sober Blog:  The more delight I have, the less I can even hear wine talking to me, and Wolfie's call becomes fainter and fainter!