Yesterday while I was walking on the way to the garden of our beautiful farm, I noticed I was annoyed and angry, and kind of depressed about life, and I could not find a reason for feeling this way as much as I looked at my life and what might have triggered the upset. As I started to explore the feelings more, I noticed a kind of dark shadow over my life at that moment and I was somewhat hunched over.

I thought to myself, “This is crazy, I have what I want. I live where I want to live, I am married to who I want to be with, we are comfortable financially, I am rowing competitively and able to row. What is going on?”

Normally I would ignore this feeling and just go through my day with the edge of enthusiasm missing, the satisfaction and joy evaporating. I would get involved in some activity but the shadow would remain, robbing me of the thrill of being alive and tending to make me withdraw from Diane.

Sometimes I would talk myself out of it, consciously looking for beauty, or reminding myself of my good fortune. This time I just observed the dark shadow and the anger and the lack of enthusiasm and my hunched over posture. And all of it of course disappeared.

I realized that against the backdrop of a live that I love with Diane, my old nemesis of “This isn’t it” is revealing itself for the pattern it is. My mind continually seems to want to rob me of joy and make a problem out of our good life. But now I am on to it at a new level, so I expect to see it overshadow my life less and less.

I am blessed with the good fortune to have such a supportive partner, who less and less gets hocked when I am upset and withdrawn and to have a life that I actually want which becomes a backdrop to reveal these subtle patterns. Even though often uncomfortable and “aliveness damaging” I also welcome these upsets as I know they are the door to more joy and happiness once I can observe them and they disappear.

May your life be blessed,
Landon