There are days that feel like they are just dragging on without end, and then all of a sudden your child is ten. Or an adult. I remember asking my Dad what it was like to be eighty, and he said, “Do you remember what it was like to be twenty?” I said I did. “Well, it’s like that, except somehow my body is eighty.”
I’ve learned that some events just fly by — weddings, funerals, good parties. I’d love to bottle up whatever it is that makes them go so quickly, because it’s the same thing that gives them so much life. It has something to do with the people, of course. I’ve been to weddings that just seemed to take forever, and in retrospect, I probably didn’t want to be there in the first place. And I’ve been to funerals that were real celebrations of life, and I enjoyed the conversations so much that I didn’t want to leave.
The people we choose to spend time with make our lives better or worse, and when you are with people who genuinely care about you, time passes quickly. There is a converse perspective on this — when you genuinely care about others, you can help them enjoy their time more, and actually improve their lives. Alfred Adler had this right a long time ago — mental health is “an interest in the interests of others.” The more attention we pay to the lives of others, the healthier we get.
I was in a class recently with a woman who was clearly having a bad day. My initial impulse was to just ignore her and her negative comments. But then I remembered the quote from Ian MacLaren: “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.”
It didn’t take much to turn things around. I asked how she was doing, and a long difficult story eventually came out. We talked for a while, and her mood improved. But here’s the interesting thing — so did mine. Rather than silently grousing about this surly classmate, I felt lighter, and the mood in the room lifted.
