From Seeing Problems to Beauty
Sometimes I catch myself going about my day or week with a problem solving approach to life. I find myself going from task to task fixing things; “I need to book a doctor’s appointment for my daughter,” “I need to address that issue at work,” “I want to shovel my neighbour’s driveway.” While addressing problems head on are important, I find I can get invited into finding problems that may not exist. As it turns out my daughter’s issue does not need medical intervention, the “issue” at work was more something for me to be curious about rather than fix, I can help my neighbours when I’m able but I don’t need to take full responsibility for them. It gets me to wondering about women’s expectations and that we are trained to see issues as within our responsibility to address. Many men certainly are stepping up to take on more of a balanced distribution of work within heterosexual relationships, and this is important progress.
I notice for me, my solving problems approach to life is more pronounced when I am stressed. What I am learning though, is that while it’s important to have this approach at times to get things done, it is also stifling to go about life from this lens. When I shift instead to noticing beauty; the way the snowflakes are blowing sideways through the sky, the way the spruce trees are shivering in the cold winter’s wind, the way my daughter calls me “Mama,” this opens my heart to connection. I move from seeing the world as problems to be fixed, to magical moments I can bear witness to and be part of. I can feel my mental health lighten and my connections with the wider world strengthen.
My hope for you on these cold dark winter days is that in the midst of many problems to address, that you too will pause to notice beauty. At any given moment there are gifts available to us if we have a heart to behold them.