How to Find Positivity in Everyday Life: From Laundry to Love to Skipping in the Sea
The Sunday Best Round Up #21
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“Well you're full of the joys of spring” uttered a swimmy friend yesterday in the ocean.
The reason for her remark?
I was gaily skipping through the ocean waves with ne’er a care in the world.
Bedecked in my finest blue flowery board shorts and oldie-baldie head I daresay I looked a tad odd.
But I cared-eth not.
My mind was in a yummy space and it was urging me to skip.
So skip I did.
And enjoyed every, decidedly un-ballectic, moment.
(Bald Bloke. Hairy chest. Proper tacky swim shorts. How much more unballetic could I be?)
“But what led to all this watery merriment?” I hope you are asking…
Well that my dear reader is the point of this little tale.
First we need to rewind several days to my bedroom.
Eugggghh!
No… don't worry it's not one of THOSE type of stories.
I'm English for goodness sakes 😀, we don’t talk about such matters in public.
We’d probably spill our tea and crumpets with embarrassment, or something.
Nah I was in the bedroom sorting out the family laundry to be put away.
Kind of a benign task for a Substack writer of international fame… but… you know… gotta keep it real 😀.
Whilst folding the t-shirts and sorting the underwear I was listening to a cast of the pod featuring renowned meditation and mindfulness type Tara Brach.
(Side Note - I have 3 daughters and there’s always a tad of hilarity when “dad's done the washing” as no one has underwear that actually fits for about a week. Due to my reluctance to check the size labels and complete inability to guess at sizes!)
Anyway laundry antics aside; on this podcast Tara was talking about the massive divides in the world at the moment.
Wars, elections, civil unrest.
And the inevitable conflict this brings between people.
Her view, based on her Buddhist beliefs, is that to truly move forward from conflict we need to see the other side's pain.
Everyone's view whether it's political, ethical, or moral comes from somewhere.
Often internal pain.
When a person holds a fairly ghastly view about someone based on their birthplace, skin colour, gender, sexuality, disability or other kind of difference; on the surface that view just looks wrong, ugly and unjustly prejudiced.
Which it is, when looked at through the simple lens of your moral compass.
Discrimination is clearly not cool.
But it doesn't really help anyone move forward.
In such a scenario you soon start to dislike the other person and what they stand for.
Further cementing the divide.
Tara teaches that to move forward you must first show compassion.
Understand what's going on for that other person.
They might have racist, misogynist, homophobic, or ableist, views.
But what makes them that way?
Fear of upsetting their parents who hold those views?
Fear of the world being made terrible through diversity, stoked by politicians or media?
Fear based on previous historical persecution of whichever group they identify with?
There’s always a deeper fear.
And when you understand and empathise with that deeper fear; suddenly you're not in conflict.
You're in a place of understanding and cooperation.
Where funnily enough it's more likely that good things will happen.
Which makes pretty good sense to me.
And my brain absorbed this pretty high level world view stuff and did some thinking at a more micro level in my own life.
(Big shout out to subconscious me… 🧠🤯)
My brain translated this information into a very ‘here and now’ problem for me.
There's a person very close to me who has been suffering with their health a lot lately.
It's definitely impacted my relationship with them in a negative way.
And I've totally been a part of that.
To my shame.
I’ve offered some compassion and support;
But not enough.
I've too quickly gone into “you really should be doing x y and z to improve your health" mode.
Which is just hashtag annoying and hashtag proper unhelpful.
I have never meant it in a mean way.
But over time I can see some of my body language, remarks, and probably (tbh) the things I HAVEN'T said, have been damaging and a bit judgey.
And without any eruption of arguments or fights, I can see our relationship has become less close.
This morning I spent time with this other person.
Just chatting.
Listening to their problems.
Telling them how much I love them.
How much they mean to me.
How important being with them is to me.
We connected closer than we had for some time.
They felt happy, relaxed, and that bit more secure inside.
I felt a deeper connection to them.
(I don't normally share deets of other people in this blog due to wanting to respect people's privacy. But at this point it probably makes sense to point out that the ‘other’ in this story is my long-suffering wife. Long-suffering as in putting up with me and my childish silly ridiculous immature pathetic addictve particular ways.)
And the moment was just so… for want of a better word… nice.
Love ‘n’ connection…
Connection ‘n’ love..
Goes together like a horse ‘n’ carriage…
(As the famous song clearly doesn’t go!)
And after this scene of domestic love and solitude I threw on my sea shorts, jumped on my bike and cycled to the beach.
Headed into the ocean skipping like a spirited child.
With all the yummy feelz.
From whence we started this merriest of stories.
Which I hope has brought you a tad of positivity today.
Maybe even a little hope for the future.
As compassion and empathy appear to be for the win methinks.
Have a great Sunday,
JFT Beach
Article I Wrote on Substack This Week:
The Secret to Happiness? A Morning Dip, A Beach Hut, and Old Friends Over Coffee - A tale of happiness in a beach community.
A Note I Shared on Substack This Week:
5 Health and Wellness Articles I Enjoyed on Substack This Week:
Who Really Belongs at Yoga? This is a nice short piece on the benefits of yoga for ALL regardless of body shape or fancy brand of yoga pants, thanks
you are the STORIES, not the novel, of your life A great short message from
on how to live life, and also perhaps inadvertently, write a Substack.You Don’t Have To Think This Thought Got problems over-thinking? This 1 minute read from
can help you out of them.Why It's Hard to Choose Real Happiness
shares the distinctions of happiness, what we need to strive for, and the Joys of meditation5 Small Changes to Transform Your Morning from Frantic to Focused Super simple and actionable advice for a better morning. I do some of this especially the night before prep. My swim shorts and towel always packed in my bag in the hallway ready for my daily dip. Need a morning overhaul? Read this from
I hope you enjoyed today’s little compendium. If you did, please do me a favour and re-stack it, or add a comment below. I’d REALLY REALLY appreciate it.
To Lazy Sunday Afternoons,
JFT Beach
PS Thanks to the following for… well… following!
Yep this week the following lovely people have started following me on Substack thanks to all of you
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Please drop links to any new and interesting Substack articles you’ve read lately as I’m always looking for more to share on a Sunday.
hoo BOY honey, did you ever hit the nail on the head with this one. As anyone dealing with illnesses (especially chronic ones) can attest, the #1 most harmful thing people do is make suggestions - and it's not because they are coming from a place of judgement or hostility, because usually it's just the opposite. It's because often the person suggesting doesn't have the full picture (for any number of health privacy reasons) and is not directly involved in that particular patient's care, so they don't know what has been tried or not, what has worked or not, what could be dangerous or not, etc. Simply being there and being a friend is what we want. It's more than enough, and often what people are afraid to give, especially if someone gets a heavy diagnosis like cancer. (And yes, I have had friends get cancer and say exactly this, that people simply fall away as friends just because they don't know how to react.)
Spot on. We have to connect to the need which is often hidden under fear. Rosenburg's Non Violent Communication method is excellent for explaining this. But is it easy to do? Not often! Judgement often creeps in, even for the best of intentions. It's worth trying, though!