Wednesday, April 9, 2014

On the Other Hand... Learning Gratitude

So yesterday was one of those days. Bear woke me up at around 4:20 and I didn’t really ever get back to sleep. Found out first thing in the morning that our washing machine mysteriously has decided that it doesn’t want to complete the spin cycle so Bear’s diapers were all sopping. I tried to do another load on another cycle just to see and it came out sopping as well, I finally decided to just do my best and wring everything out by hand as much as possible before putting them in the dryer. Monkey got stuck in math and got frustrated with me and wouldn’t talk to me for a while and wanted to just give up on it. The kids have gone through most of the snacks (today is shopping day) so I heard grumbles off and on all day of “what is there to eat?!”. It rained the night before and for a good while that day so our basement was flooding and I spent at least two hours down there trying to help get the water out. The girls I’m supposed to watch were both running late because of the rain (meaning that we were all waiting at the bus stop getting drenched), and one of them had apparently had a long day and was a little cranky. I couldn’t find my keys. Everyone was coughing all over the place. The list could really go on, like I said it was just that kind of day.

On the other hand. Bear actually slept through until he woke me up at 4:20, I don’t usually get those nights, we’re still usually up twice a night together. It felt great getting up early and starting work before the kids were up and the house was still peaceful and quiet. I at least have a washing machine and dryer and clothes to put in them. Thankfully I had just gotten a big box of disposable diapers for Bear so we weren’t in a desperate need for the cloth ones. Monkey and Tiger both made some great accomplishments in math and overall are doing really well with their lessons. The kids had fun watching a new episode of Studio C (it’s pretty much their favorite show). The rain meant that spring is actually coming and is helping to get rid of all the snow. At least the water is in the basement and not the rest of the house and we’ve actually been able to manage it fairly well. We were able to find enough snacks to make everyone at least mostly happy. I didn’t miss either of the girls from their bus stops. I found my keys. We may still be coughing but it’s gotten a lot better than it was just 2 days ago. The list could go on and on.

Even though so much of yesterday was frustrating and just plain exhausting there was also a lot that was good. Everyone has things that they can be thankful for, we just have to train ourselves to look for them. When we look only at all the bad things we get weighed down with all the negativity. If we take a moment and look on the other hand and focus on the positive it really doesn’t seem so bad. The amazing thing is that if we keep choosing to look at things in a positive way it becomes the first reaction instead of the second and we’ll end up over all being a lot more happy. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t want that!

Now I don’t want to sound like I’m bragging. My first reactions to most of yesterday were still very much focused on the negative. I alternately felt like there was no way we could take care of all that needed to be done, wanting to take a sledgehammer to something, wanting to just go disappear somewhere and take a nice long nap and ignore everyone, and wanting to shout and kick and cry. I am learning to look on the other hand though and at this point it was enough to help keep me from going off the deep end. I keep telling myself to just keep at it, keep looking for the good and things will be all right, because as frustrated as I get I know that things have a way of doing that if you can just be patient and give them some time. 

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