Contentment

But like happiness, excellence and drive, contentment is not something you can just generate from within.
Read more at http://www.relevantmagazine.com/life/what-if-having-extraordinary-life-isnt-point#vJyPMCSoY1HeMZSS.99

We moved here a little over a year ago.  I never thought this state or this little town is a place where I would end up.  I thought it was a one horse town till I saw the other towns.  It’s definitely a 10 horse town or however that rating system goes.  We have Chinese food, Mexican Food, three markets, fast food, a ton of hotels because apparently this is the last place to stop before you fall off the map.  My husband told me he really liked it here.  Which is a big deal for him.  I told him, I am content.

Which went over like a big ass rock in a really tiny puddle.  That quote hit me at how often I have been focusing on contentment this year without noticing it.  I used to really believe contentment was something you could find deep down inside of you.  Something that you could go to church and get by just listening and learning and being all Christian.  You could be content like you could be not-depressed.  You could be content like you could be the perfect mother. There was a perfect formula to conjure up contentment just like there was a perfect formula for being a good Christian family.

These things come from somewhere else.  They come from letting go. Seeking out and giving yourself to something else.

Contentment

• the feeling I get when I sigh
• how I feel when I go on a bike ride and the sky is so big (hint, hint)
• when I wake up with kids all snuggle up to me
• the moment I see my husband get home from his crazy work schedule

When I get kisses from my pug who likes to seek out birdshit and I know she does that but still her kisses…

Clean sheets at the end of a long day.

Clean coffee cups in the morning.

Getting all the laundry clean.

Going to the coffee shop and no one else is there.

Contentment is like happy but sneakier.