Co-exist: Day 3 of #100daysofhappiness

Gluten Free cardamom donut from Urban Standard in downtown Birmingham, AL

I'm only on Day 3, and already I'm coming up against the feeling that this #100daysofhappiness challenge is a little false, a pretense. These days are tough right now, and I often feel like the sunlight is dimmer than it used to be and sad, grieving tears are an every day occurrence.  I miss home, it's hard to say goodbye to the life I lived so fully in Asheville.    Even as I look around and find a thousand reasons to be grateful, I can't shake the heavy blanket on my shoulders. 

I can still smile as I bite into the blueberry cardamom donut I found in a coffee shop and sigh with pleasure as I watch the play of light on green grass as I sit in a park.  Within me is the deep joy of finding a man who loves me resoundingly and the unconditional friendship of my sweet husky.  Yet it's there, the sadness.  Along with it-- the shame, the guilt. Why can't I be grateful for what I have?  Why isn't it ever enough? 

The fight against my oncoming depression is to stay busy.  I organize, I clean, I make dates with people I hope desperately will be my new friends. I take up running.

It started to take me over last weekend.  When one of my new friends announced she's moving.  She's going to design school in Atlanta.  I shrugged the seeping, oozing sense of fear I felt on hearing this news off.  It doesn't matter, I barely know her--I'll meet so many new people!  But the next day, another friend I have in Birmingham said she's moving to Texas for a great job opportunity. 

I'm thrilled for both of them, truly I am.  But suddenly, the small progress I made towards what matters most to me-- friendship-- is gone.   The loss of these new friends felt a thousand times magnified as the faces of all my friends that I could depend on, that I saw so regularly in Asheville came to mind.

Suddenly, I felt so alone.  

Then Ben went out of town.  He had to go for work and I chose to stay in our apartment and work on some tasks that I felt needed a long bout of concentration-- my website, my business cards, my blog, my resume, etc. All the very time consuming and focused tasks that come with moving your own business to a new town. 

Frustration.  Why should I start over?  Will teaching yoga ever really pay off?  Will my often very soft voice be heard among the loud funky fun playlists in hot classes and rumble of trains that make up this new town? 

These last few days I question everything. For the hundredth time since I taught my first yoga class, I wonder why I'm doing it.  I teach today, at 4.  No one showed up to my class on Tuesday.  I expect that, it's going to happen.  But I'd be lying if I said it doesn't affect me.  

Yet at the same time, I know I won't stop.  I know it way deep inside me, that the passion I have for teaching, for connecting with other people in this special way--is deeply important to me.  

So is this challenge a waste of time?  Does everyone who sees these pictures want to roll their eyes?  Do they see that behind these single moments in my day, I'm struggling to stay passionate?  

Last night, I crumpled to my knees against the cupboards in the kitchen, curled up with my head between my knees.  I wasn't thinking-- just feeling again the weight of change, the grief of letting go of one chapter of my life to start another.  I looked up and saw the brightly colored hand towels I bought the other day, I saw the herbs sitting prettily on the windowsill. I was happy--yet sad.

Finding beauty in our lives is useful-- it doesn't mean the pain and heartache, the suffering of everyday life disappears. It all co-exists.  

So maybe this challenge isn't a pretense?  Maybe I can find moments of happiness even as I struggle?  And don't you want to know I can?    

Clean crisp sheet spread on a shady spot in the park with a good book.