Choosing a Positive Attitude

I was overwhelmingly touched by the attitude of a young couple I met while volunteering as a hospice chaplain. I visited their home because Jim, the husband, was in the last stages of cancer and they wanted to talk about his eventual memorial service. Because they were a young couple with kids, I was anticipating a somber, grief-stricken atmosphere. I was wrong. Jim’s wife, Morgan, greeted me at the door with a smile and said, “Hi, come on in. The house is kinda chaotic cause the kids are at the tail end of a sleepover and on a sugar high.” With the exception of the gaunt young man lying on a hospital bed in the living room, the energy of both house and inhabitants was exactly what you’d expect from one brimming with sleep-deprived, sugar-stimulated kids—loud, boisterous, and happy.

Over the course of the next few weeks, Jim and Morgan taught me many lessons about appreciating each moment and looking on the bright side of things. Of course they had their down times, and she had fears about the loneliness of a life without Jim and how she could be both Mom and Dad to the kids. But underneath every joy and each heartache was an incredible stability and a belief that life was good. After several weeks, I asked how they maintained such a positive attitude. Both credited their parents for teaching them to accentuate the positive and look for the good, happy, and beautiful in everything. “It’s just become second nature,” Jim explained a few days before he died.

PRACTICE…

• Set an intention to be more positive and look for the good, happy, and beautiful within all experiences and people (including yourself).

Excerpted from The Woman's Book of Mindfulness by Sue Patton Thoele. Available on Amazon.