We’ve all been there.  It seems like there is a cloud around me that just won’t cease.

My head cold happens to coincide with my house being painted. There are ladders, wood scrapings, nails, and worker garbage everywhere.  My windows are completely clouded from the paint that ran down as they power washed the house, and as I sit with my morning cup trying to look outside… I realize that again, there is a cloud around me that just won’t go away.

I’m crabby, frustrated and feeling overwhelmed.

I try to remind myself that I’m lucky to have a house, it’s going to look great once it’s painted, and of course this silly head cold will clear.

But now as I sit in the middle of it all, none of my rational thoughts really matter.

To me, in this moment, life is cloudy.

Head colds clear, windows are squeegeed clean, life goes on and, frankly, there are far bigger things to concern myself with these days. Yet as I lay in my bed last night, I realized that when we’re in the middle of something in which we have no control, it’s easy to spin out and get negative. Especially when control is something that gives us all that illusion of peace.

I remember that real peace has nothing to do with circumstance. Real peace sits in the center of the storm regardless of how long it lasts or how frustrating it is…

Feeling peaceful when my life is easy is a cop out. If I let life dictate my peace, then I am posed for one wild roller coaster ride after another… All the meditation,  yoga, and talking about peace just becomes insignificant and fake when I’m thrown off balance so easily.

As much as I resist admitting it, my outlook may be cloudy today, but somewhere inside, it’s my own responsibility to shine.

xo

Image Courtesy of Marin at Freedigitalphotos.net