practicing happiness

Some twelve years ago, when I was a tender, mumbly sophomore in college, I applied for a small scholarship from a philanthropic foundation specializing in journalistic education. In order to get the scholarship, I had to be interviewed over the phone by some hard-nosed news editor who evaluated all the scholarship candidates. I've forgotten just about every detail of that uncomfortable little exchange, but I do remember the editor closing the interview by asking me some ridiculously lofty question, something like, "What do you think the most important thing for humans to do with themselves in this day and age?"

I was extraordinarily nervous about this whole interview, and not at all prepared for a question of that magnitude, but I remember scraping together my faltering self-assurance and saying something incredibly somber like, "I think it's important for humans to really be serious and do a good job in everything they do." That was basically my answer.

Years later, I'm recalling that conversation and wondering how it was that I got to be so serious. Endless productivity is a massive bore.

Maybe what I'm starting to feel this week is a weird byproduct of being a distant heir of that pack of overzealous, hardworking Puritans that came over on the Mayflower a few generations ago. I don't know. But as of this week, being on vacation is starting to get hard.

When you go on an open-ended sabbatical with no job waiting for you at the end, the rat brain comes out to play. No matter how much the rational part of my brain knows that I am completely fine, the rat brain does not care. The past few days, I have begun to feel some weird tremors of worry, panic, and scarcity. Real rat brain stuff, stuff I haven't felt in a while. In an idle moment, I will start thinking about how I need to find work. Or I'll get agitated, or chide myself to do something "productive."

This afternoon, I took a long walk, and I realized that my job right now is to practice happiness. To simply rest, enjoy my time off, and to be content. There is absolutely no need to flail around and wonder anxiously where I'm going to get a job. There's much more to life than being endlessly serious and productive. I want to fully enter this state of uncertainty, and to do so knowing that I am sustained and safe.

The poem I just posted in Ephemera speaks beautifully to this issue. I think I need to print that poem out and tape it to my forehead so I don't forget.

things to try

One week into unemployment. Last week I joined my boyfriend for a trip to see his family in Virginia. It was such a pleasure to take that trip, smack dab in the middle of the week, to spend long afternoons strolling the beautiful countryside where his family lives instead of sitting through another painfully boring meeting in which a dozen topics of no interest or use were discussed ad nauseam.

Nope. I'm not missing my old job too much these days.

I know these unoccupied, unscheduled days won't last forever, so I'm trying to make good use of the time while I've got it. I've started a list titled "Things to Try" and I'm having a lot of fun adding new items to it. It's not a list of "Things to DO," mind you. At this point a long list of things I had to do would feel restrictive and slavish. No, this list contains "suggested activities." This list is a polite garçon standing at my elbow saying, "Perhaps the lady would like to email Jane now about having lunch together next week?"

It is just so satisfying to make lists. But with this list, I don't need to feel any guilt if I don't cross off one of the elements of the list. It is a list about possibilities.

Here are a few items on the list:

• Paint a wall?
• Photostroll to middle Georgia
• Go visit Sheila and Atticus
• Register for some Dance 101 classes
  
• Clean out coat closet
• Have a Flickr pin show?
• Dinner party for building?
  

I have been staying busy with the list, and already crossed several items off the list. That feels good. (My first Dance 101 class is tonight!)