Weekly Inspiration: Small Joys in Everyday Life

Today's Weekly Inspiration features a book recommendation, and a favorite quote from that book.

This spring, I had the wonderful opportunity to review a new novel, My Ex-Life, by a prolific author I'd never read before, Stephen McCauley. I also interviewed Stephen and thoroughly enjoyed our conversation, and then met him at Booktopia, a book event held in Vermont every May. I absolutely loved the novel, which was engaging and combines insights into human nature and life with plenty of laugh-out-loud humor. And the author was just as warm, funny, and charming as his book. You can read my review here and my interview with Stephen here on the Shelf Awareness website. So, if you enjoy reading fiction, I highly recommend My Ex-Life...and now I am excited to read some of Stephen's earlier novels, too.

I wrote a bunch of quotes from the novel into my Quote Journal - Stephen just has a way with words and many of his sentences and passages are either insightful or hilarious (or sometimes both). Here's the one I want to share with you today that expresses my own views:

"Julie had always believed that even if it's the big, unexpected events (good and bad) that make life memorable and exciting, it's the small, predictable routines that hold life together and make it worth living."         

          - from My Ex-Life by Stephen McCauley

(and if you want to see a sample of Stephen's humor, my review includes one of his humorous quotes!)

I love this sentiment and heartily agree with it. I think this is something I didn't recognize until after my illness (though having kids helped me realize its truth, too). I have especially noticed this in looking back over old photos - the holidays and vacations and big events were wonderful, and I am glad we have so many photos of those, but I wish we had more photos (and video) of just normal daily life when our kids were little.

As for my life now, this statement is especially true of life with chronic illness. The big events are often overwhelming for me and challenging, and I often have mixed feelings - excitement but also dread and fear at the same time. But I look forward every day to the "small, predictable routines" of my daily life - the cup of herbal tea every morning by the window, taking a walk around my neighborhood and admiring the flowers and changing seasons, sitting in my recliner working on a writing assignment, setting my laptop aside at 7:30 pm each night to lie on the couch and enjoy two TV shows with my husband. Rather than being boring, these routines bring me joy!

In fact, I wrote an article for ProHealth (and wrote many times here on my blog) about Finding Joy in Every Day, where I discussed exactly this idea, including my Joy Journal habit. I find it comforting that even when I can't participate in the bigger events - have to cancel out of an evening out or a family weekend - I know that these quiet joys are here for me, every day. I think I appreciate them much more now than when I spent all my time running around before I got sick.

What are the small, predictable routines of your life that bring you joy?