Fr. Don's Daily Reflection - November 12, 2024
Photo by Cathy Lampert
Psalm 62: “In you alone is my soul at rest. My help comes from You.”
Conceivably, some people are “naturally” cheerful as we say; but happiness, a deeper reality, is not simply a matter of temperament. It is partly our choice and partly the by-product of something else good that we are doing. It's a choice insofar as we can choose how we look at life, how we respond to its hardships and heartbreaks, its delights and joys.
If we start with the basic premise that life itself is a gift, not something we produced, we have a basis for looking at everything with thanksgiving. And the result of that is happiness. If we start with the opposite premise that everything we have and are and even more is owed to us, we're sure to be unhappy.
Further, happiness is the by-product of work well done, life well lived, love and appreciation generously given. “My opinion,” ancient Chinese writer Chuang Tsu says, “is that you never find happiness till you stop looking for it.” Someone else put it like this: take care of truth, goodness and love, and happiness will take care of itself, will come of itself.
Pursuing happiness itself easily means chasing entertainment. “Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” is a well-known phrase. Forgive my presumption, but I think the “pursuit” part is misleading. Genuine happiness can be ours independently of a search for excitement and variety, of any “pursuit”; it's something much deeper in us that can coexist with surface trials and worries.
Psalm 27: “I believe I shall see the Lord’s goodness / in the land of the living.
Wait for the Lord; be strong; / be stouthearted, and wait for the Lord!”
