A while back, I received a message from an acquaintance telling me that I have an amazing life.
It was a kind message, and I appreciated it. I can certainly acknowledge that there are many things in my life that are good. My work is rewarding. My children have launched well or are preparing to. My grandchildren are adorable (even when they’re being little stinkers). My house projects are…well, they get finished eventually.
Still, the message made me cringe a little because I felt like a fraud.
Life just moves too fast. I frequently feel like I’m barely capable of producing average results, let alone excelling. I make mistakes. I get overwhelmed. I worry. I procrastinate. Many things don’t get done that should, and many things get done that could wait. I sometimes feel like everyone else received a handbook on adulthood, but somehow I got skipped and now, at 52, I’m still figuring things out.
So why do people look at my life and see something amazing?
I’ve thought about that quite a bit.
I think what they see isn’t perfection. I think they see someone who keeps moving forward. They see the smile. They see the effort. They see the choice to try again tomorrow.
What many people don’t see is that this has not always come naturally to me.
For years, I struggled with the advice that happiness is a choice.
Honestly, I thought it was narrow and trite saying.
When you’re a single mother working nights, when you’re in an abusive relationship, when you’re worried about money, when you literally have zero dollars and just want to buy milk… happiness can feel very far away. It doesn’t feel like a choice. It feels like a luxury reserved for people whose lives are easier than yours.
Over the years, I tried all the things people recommend.
Gratitude journals. Meditation. Prayer. Making myself identify things I appreciated even though life was pulling me down.
“I’m thankful my car’s air conditioning works.”
“The sunshine feels good on my face.”
“No one died.”
Those practices helped for a while, but they never seemed to create lasting change.
Yet I kept trying.
For more than twenty years, I tried to focus on the good.
Looking back, I can see that things were gradually improving. Much of that change happened over the past ten years. Even more over the past five. And if I’m being honest, the greatest change has happened within the past two years.
In the past year, I have experienced a level of happiness that I haven’t felt in a very, very long time. Maybe not since childhood. Maybe ever.
At first I assumed the explanation was obvious. The kids grew up. My earning potential increased. My problem-solving skills improved. I left an abusive relationship. Life just became easier.
But I don’t think that’s the whole story.
Somewhere along the way, I heard a phrase: “Embrace the suck.” I don’t remember where I heard it. Maybe online. Maybe in a movie. Maybe from someone I know.
At first I laughed at it because it was brash and another way of saying “it is what it is.”
But then, I hated it.
I didn’t want to embrace the suck. I didn’t want to be comfortable with difficult circumstances. I didn’t want to tolerate the hurt. I didn’t want to just accept that life can suck and barrel through hard times.
But then, I began interpreting the phrase differently.
Instead of trying to find something good despite the hardship, I started finding something to be grateful for within the hardship.
The basement flooded and insurance denied the claim. I was thankful I had a credit card. But it was deeper than that. Each day I discovered that I could handle more than I thought. I learned that panic passes and problems eventually become projects. And those projects were difficult—nothing is as easy as it looks on YouTube, trust me on this. The hardship revealed that I was capable of learning skills and solving problems I never imagined I could handle.
I spent three days in the ICU. It was scary, and I felt alone and worried. I was, of course, thankful for friends, family, and providers who helped me. But what was beautiful was that, for the first time in years, life forced me to stop. I couldn’t fix anything. I couldn’t help anyone. I couldn’t be productive. I simply had to receive care and exist. The hardship taught me that my value wasn’t tied to my productivity.
I got out of an abusive relationship. I was using therapeutic communication skills to help another person regulate their emotions. Giving someone love that then returns anger and pain to you is… well, it’s horrible. The relationship revealed my capacity for patience, compassion, loyalty, and endurance. Every day it taught me what love is not, which ultimately helped me understand what love is.
Finding gratitude within the hardship changed how I carried the problem.
I realized I wasn’t simply looking for a silver lining. I wasn’t trying to distract myself from the problem by focusing on something unrelated that was going well. I was looking for the Beautiful hidden within the difficulty itself.
What was this experience teaching me?
What strength was it developing?
What truth was it revealing?
Sometimes the hardship contained patience. Sometimes perspective. Sometimes humility. Sometimes courage. Sometimes it simply reminded me that I was capable of carrying more than I thought.
The difficulty doesn’t become enjoyable. It doesn’t become fair. But it becomes meaningful.
And that makes life Beautiful.
My life if amazing. Not because life is perfect. Not because it isn’t messy. Not because I’ve somehow mastered happiness.
But because I have learned to look for the Beautiful.
Not after the difficulty has passed.
Within it.
And that has made all the difference.
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