Happiness? Contentment? Satisfaction? Which should I decide to seek?
This summer I attended the memorial service for Doris Odor, a 96-year-old saint who became our friend when she moved close by several years ago. I knew her as gracious, smiling, and always interested in anyone she met. There was a pleasant peace about her I didn’t fully understand until I attended her funeral.
Ruth celebrated her 90th birthday in 2017 with a large meeting room full of guests who loved her. Evelyn and I snagged her away from the crowd long enough to get a picture.
The chapel held friends and admirers from all over the country. She had touched uncounted lives in the churches where her husband served as a pastor, in our congregation and the retirement community where she lived after he died, and through the influence of her sons, also pastors, and their families.
She had planned her service long before she died, stipulating that each of her grandchildren should quote one of her favorite Bible verses. In addition, each was given 10 minutes to share a memory of their grandmother.
One comment in that parade of praise still stands out to me today. “I was impressed by how contented she always seemed to be,” her granddaughter said. “I asked her how she never seemed to get upset by whatever life handed her, and she replied, ‘I must pray to be content—every day.’”
Every day! This woman who emanated grace and goodness, who always offered positive encouragement, and who never complained did not get that way by accident! She asked God to help her be content. And his answer to that prayer was clear to all who knew her.
I need to follow Doris’s example.
For sure, I am resigned to my current situation. I don’t resent my duties, although some of them are unpleasant. I don’t pine for experiences I no longer get to enjoy (although as often as I’ve claimed that at this blog, I’m wondering if I want this to be true more than it actually is). I’ve followed the advice of others to take care of myself, and I really look forward to each pleasant experience I can have away from the daily grind.
This period of persistent grief and limited pleasure is only a chapter, I tell myself. It could be worse. I’m not complaining.
But am I content? Maybe I’d better know the answer to that question if I prayed for contentment. We won’t develop positive qualities just by sitting in a corner and waiting for them to wash over us. How would my perspective change if I gave some energy to improving it?
Ruth, the elder care coach who facilitates my support group, has helped me here. After reading the post I wrote for my church’s blog about happiness vs. joy, she shared a conversation she had with her therapist years ago. She’d been bemoaning the fact that she had not found happiness, and her counselor asked her, “Would you accept satisfaction?”
Ruth Rothbart-Mayer, LCSW, C-ASWCM
“You can imagine my response,” Ruth remembers. “No. Happy! I want to be happy,” she insisted. She shared that only with “time” and “great and sometimes labored reflection” did she decide that “feeling satisfied may be more attainable and have the potential for longer lasting gains.”
Psychotherapy led Ruth to a place similar to that experienced by Doris’s pursuit of God. I want to get there too. Can I be satisfied by all the goodness supporting me in on this challenging walk? Can I be content even when I’m tempted to dwell on all the ways life is not turning out for Evelyn and me as I would have wanted?
For now, I’d say contentment feels elusive; there’s always something to interrupt it. But I realize I do have moments of deep satisfaction. I’ll plan to share at least a couple of them in this space next week.