Finding Joy in the Rain
This year, I heard about an Easter tradition where people watch the sunrise on Easter morning. This idea called to me for a few reasons. First, I’ve been looking for more ways to commemorate the holiness of this holiday. Also, when I had the idea for my first business 8 years ago, I was doing what I called a daily #mymorning meditation practice. Each morning, I would watch the sunrise, read scripture, meditate, and journal. I really enjoyed the practice, but when I got pregnant with my third baby, I didn’t have the physical capacity to keep it up. Honestly, I’ve missed it. So, hearing about this Easter tradition motivated me to try having a #mymorning again.
Saturday night, I set a reminder to go to bed early. I even added a sunrise emoji to the reminder for little extra hype for the morning. The local news had shown photos from earlier in the week with spectacular red, purple, and gold sunrises and these added to my excitement. When my alarm chimed, I wasn’t even tempted to hit snooze. I rolled out of my warm blankets and proceeded to put on my warmest, fuzziest, comfort clothes (right down to the fluffy socks). While getting dressed, I noticed the gentle tapping of rain on my roof and windows. This was my first indicator that perhaps the morning wasn’t going to go as planned. I convinced myself, however, that the sun could still break through the clouds and show me something incredible. I went downstairs, made a cup of tea, and peered outside.
It was raining really hard. The sky was dark enough that my garden solar lights were still gently glowing. The sun was supposed to be up within the next 10 minutes, how could it look so gloomy?!
One of the things I’ve had to work on the most in the last year is sitting with the uncomfortable. I was listening to Jay Shetty last week and he mentioned a study where participants were offered the choice to either sit with their thoughts for 15 minutes or receive an electric shock. 23% of the women and 65% of the men chose the shock. Sitting with our uncomfortable emotions, especially disappointment, is hard. My hopes for that morning were high, but I had to face the fact that I was not going to get the sunrise I wanted and I needed to decide what I was going to do with my disappointment.
I chose to not only sit with it, but to open my heart and my mind to the possibility of something else happening that morning. I grabbed my blanket, an umbrella, and my warm cup of tea and went outside to watch the sunrise anyway. I never did see the sun that morning. I didn’t even see its outline. But the sky did get lighter (even if it just went from dark gray to light gray). Even more so, I heard this:
This clip feels like 30 seconds of serenity to me.
I’m glad I went outside. I could have gotten angry. I could have asked God why he couldn’t even let me have this one thing. All I wanted was a sunrise! Hasn’t the year been hard enough? I was finally motivated again!
Instead, I let myself acknowledge that the motivation from my expectation was a good thing. It got me up and moving. Also, I found an even more valuable lesson. You see, as I sat outside, instead of seeing a myriad of colors in the sky, I heard birds who were singing despite the sun not being visible, I noticed that the colors of the flowers that are coming back after winter are more vibrant when they are in the filtered light of the cloud cover, and I sat and basked in the sound and smell of a spring rain.
I found the glory that I wanted from the sunrise was captured in small moments within the rain.
Although I couldn’t see the sun, it still rose. If I had been in an airplane, I could have seen it come up over the clouds. However, I would have also missed what was happening on the ground. Both of those perspectives matter. When I allow myself to believe in something bigger, such as the fact that the sun will rise each day – or in other words, that good things are on the horizon – then I can find motivation to prepare for those good things with whatever energy I have. Additionally, when I allow myself to be flexible to changes that present themselves, I can also find beauty in the unexpected. Even if at first it shows up as disappointment.
Thanks for being here. I hope you take a moment to find some unexpected beauty today.