Living Happiness

When I began Living Happiness a year ago, it was my sincerest wish to create a space where joy could be honored regularly. I had had enough of griping and whinging and wanted, instead, to “accentuate the positive.” So The Joy List was born.

Truth be told, the Joy List hasn’t received much of my attention this year. In fact, it’s pretty much been left off by itself wondering when the party was going to migrate its direction. Well, now the party finally is.

This past week I published a post entitled La Bella Vita in which I shared about the joys to be found in an ordinary day. I then asked you readers to share your joys and continued the conversation in our Facebook community where I received several beautiful responses, too.

All of which has led to this: moving forward, I am going to feature these ordinary instances of extraordinary joy in a weekly Sunday post. Every Sunday, I will update the Joy List with both mine and your contributions, adding (I hope) more joy to your life, as well. You will also have the chance to respond to the post with more additions of your own, either here or on Facebook.

As Sarah Ban Breathnach says:

“Each day offers us the gift of being a special occasion if we can simply learn that as well as giving, it is blessed to receive with grace and a grateful heart.”

Here are this week’s new additions to the Joy List, true instances of extraordinary joy in ordinary places, all made with the most grateful of hearts:

1. Watching my daughter sleep. ~Shelley Doolittle Bowers

2. Watching my doggies as they bask in the sun. ~Molly Wagner

3. Listening to my son’s uncontrollable laughing as I tickle him. ~Colette Porter Malone

4. My hubby brings me my first cup of coffee as I watch my hour of morning news show. Looking out my window and watching the birds early in the morning. Watching the turtle doves take a bath in the bird bath and the mocking bird chasing them away. My trip to the YMCA. ~Carolyn Cummins

5. Before my husband and I retired, our schedules were very different. He left the house much earlier than I but not before picking a rose and leaving it on the kitchen counter by the coffee that was waiting for me. I enjoy watching the critters that I feed in my back yard, watching the bluebirds raise their young in the nesting box I put up – simple things. Finishing my workout on the treadmill … watching my granddaughters grow. … ~Linda Estes

6. There’s just something about eating in dappled sunlight … or drinking wine in a breeze scented by jasmine or orange blossom … that makes everything taste better and the world feel right. ~Janice Hunter, Sharing the Journey

7. Often I find myself sitting at my desk, gazing out the window, watching the birds at the feeder and feeling blessed with all that surrounds me. It’s those little things that have come to mean so much to me. And the sun … I love the sun. It has a way of casting a glow that makes all the difference in a day. ~Barbara Swafford, Blogging Without a Blog

My additions:

8. Planting new flowers in the garden (gerberas! my favorite!) with my beautiful husband.

9. The rooster across the street that crows happily on sunny mornings.

10. My morning walk to and from the gym each day. It’s my forty minutes of thinking time.

11. The opportunity to create something of value here that touches the lives of others.

Peace and blessings to all of you,

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Photo Credit by *Claudio88