The Quest for Inner Peace

I've been thinking a lot about New Year's resolutions, and have come up with many things I'd like to do differently in 2012 -- but the one thing that trumps all when I have these inner convos is that I want to achieve inner peace.

Having struggled with bouts of depression my entire life, I have come to the realization that my idea of "happiness" will probably always elude me when it comes to attainment -- because it is an ideal that has been fed to me by the media and by other people's notions, and ironically, the people I have thought were the happiest, fall from grace all too easily. This concept of happiness is one that I think can be destructive to those who feel less than. I know for one, that I often wander around wondering why I don't feel as happy as I should, given all of my blessings in life. But I think I am framing it wrong. I am not one of those "happy go lucky" people. There are many times I wish I was, but then I wouldn't be who I am. I hurt deeply, I think too much, I empathize to my own detriment, I too often get lost in the black holes of my own mind...

But I know that inner peace may exist in spite of feeling "happy" or "sad." I want to accept who I am, not wish I was different -- and I am hoping that inner peace will spring forth from that acceptance.

My brother just sent me a great article called "The Joy of Quiet" that recently ran in the New York Times. Everyone, parents especially, should take the time to read it. It made me realize that my children and I will much more easily find our peace in the quiet. In a day and age when we are constantly bombarded with information, tweets, updates, likes, texts, emails, calls, it is the spaces between which matter the most.

May you have a "peaceful" New Year.

I took the photo above while on a walk with Miss O and Mr. A. I thought the raindrops were so beautifully poised on the leaf, such a dainty bit of nature atop a hard, cracked concrete backdrop. It just looked like poetry to me.