Choose Joy

This week has been difficult. As I sit here writing this first couple lines of this post I am waiting for a funeral for a former boss who happened to attend my church. He died last Friday and I found out Sunday night after my bible study. Monday it turns out Robin Williams died. Unless you live under a rock you know who he is. And then I found out my 88 yr old grandmother had to go to the hospital. While she turned out fine so far, we are dealing with the reality of her mortality. So death has seemed to surround me for the last couple of days.

And while there is many a debate going on about Robin Williams death because of the circumstances of it: whether it's about the state of mental health care in this country; whether suicide is a choice; whether we should care this deeply about a celebrity - someone most of the public doesn't know personally; whether it's appropriate for politicians to comment; or whether the media and the commentators are glamorizing suicide by saying he's in a better place and how that might affect others who are contemplating suicide. I’ve seen, read, and even had at least one of these conversations/arguments in the last 3 days.
(Continued tonight after work)
I even saw tonight the fact that Robin William’s daughter had to delete her social media accounts because of the negative comments criticizing how much she has posted in the last couple of days and how many photos (or lack of photos) she had of her father. I mean, really, everyone has an opinion, including even myself. And isn’t that sad. Can’t we just be supportive of each other and not pick apart anyone’s reaction. I don’t want to get into any of those conversations except to say I hope people are gentle with each other when discussing sensitive topics like this as we can do more harm than good. And for me I personally will miss Robin Williams as a source of joy for me. I grew up watching him as he was a favorite of my mothers. As a result, seeing him in a movie or on TV always gave me the sense of being home.

To discuss something, that is in reality, a little closer to home: the funeral today. It was really quite beautiful in its entirety. I barely knew my former boss but he was an example of God working in my life. When I first arrived in KC in October I got a job at a big craft store to bide my time and help out financially as I searched for full time work. In late November/December G. became my manager there at the store. When it came to scheduling he was very understanding when I said I couldn’t work on Sundays because of church. But it wouldn’t be until January when my church was doing an all church study which included sermon series, related bible study and daily devotional that I'd really find out something remarkable. I had the devotional book in my purse and as he checked it before leaving the store it was plainly there to see. He smiled and said, “He my church is doing that study…” and I replied, “So is mine!” He then asked what church I attend and after I answered he laughed and said that was his church as well. This was surprising because the store isn’t in Lee’s Summit which is where I live and where the church is located so what were the odds that we would both attend a church over a half hour away. Besides that we never crossed paths – which turned out to be because he went to the 8:00am service and I mostly go to the 12:30 service. But still it was a nice connection. We both ended up leaving that store in March/April and I had been meaning to try and see him somehow at church but I never did. And now I never will. It just proves that you have to do things when you think of them. Don’t put off anything that you can and should do now until tomorrow or to some future date.

And this also has been reiterated with my Grandmother’s health. She is 88 years old and lately she’s been having episodes of declining health or falls. One of the reasons I moved back to KC was to be near her and my other Grandma in their last years. And unfortunately I can count on two hands how many times I’ve seen both of them, let alone my maternal Grandma who has ailing health. But she’s recovered this time and I have decided to make sure I don’t squander my realization that life is short. I’ll be, starting this Sunday, going and spending Sunday afternoons with her.

For me, all of this has reminded me of my father’s death over three years ago. The reality is I should have learned my lesson about putting people off with his death. I had cut my father out of my life thinking I had all the time in the world to sort through my feelings about him and our past. And it turns out I didn’t. He died before I could reconcile with him. I have plenty of older posts that touch on his death and some of how I got through it so I won’t get into that again. But I will say it’s amazing how far I’ve come since his death. And I think, in fact, that some of my current success is due to actually having to deal with his death and reconciling my feelings about him without him here to do it.  Through that process and as a result of some deep healing I was able to learn how to choose joy despite all of my circumstances.

Choose Joy. This is becoming a mantra for me. It’s a very simple concept that took me forever to grasp. In fact it didn’t seem simple at all. Choosing to be happy didn’t make any sense to me. In fact I remember thinking that the people who told me being happy was a matter of choice were absolutely crazy. They didn’t understand my pain. But in the end it really was a choice for me. Someday I’ll sit down and write it all out. I mean again there are bits and pieces of this throughout the posts on the blog so I hope I’m being transparent enough about it.

I’ve had a long day and if I don’t stop soon I won’t get this posted. I will end with this song I heard over the weekend from Sanctus Real’s “Lay it Down.” It really hit home for me how and why I was and am able to Choose Joy.  

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I know you have your problems
‘Cause everybody's got ‘em
If you get lost in your sorrows
Then you could hit rock bottom
But if you smile in face of trivial things
And you learn to pray when you wanna complain
Stand up straight when the Earth is shaking
And just breathing when you feel afraid
Oh, don't you know

Those problems you're worried about
They can't keep you from living now
When you shake ‘em off and lay ‘em down, down, down
At the cross where your freedom's found
Oh You can stand up no matter what
March on when times are tough
Be strong and don't give up
All you need now
Is to shake ‘em off and lay ‘em down
At the cross where your freedom's found

We all have our seasons
When we get caught up in our feelings
And I know there's a time for laughter and a time for pain
A time for doubt and a time for faith
But when you believe you can find the strength
So get back up on your feet

Lay it down, lay it down
Why you holding on so tight
Oh, the freedom you will find
When you let go God will take over the fight
Oh, just surrender
And feel what it's like to be free again