Living in the Joyful Possibility of Today

Releasing the past - no matter how difficult it was

I just finished reading “The Happiest Man on Earth” by Eddie Jaku. It is his amazing account of his life before, during, and after his horrific time as a Jewish prisoner during World War II.

It is certainly a beautiful book. You can feel this man’s wonderful kind heart in all of the pages - even when he is describing horrors that we hope to never have to imagine or experience!

And, the most incredible part of the story is the picture shown above! This is Eddie on his 100th birthday! On this day, he was surrounded by his wife, children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren!

Leaving Our Past Behind

What strikes me the most this morning as I just set the book down, is how at some point, Eddie decided to leave the concentration camps behind him.

“There are survivors who will tell you that this world is bad, that all people have evil inside them, who take no joy from life. These people have not been liberated. Their broken bodies may have walked from the camps 75 years ago, but their broken hearts stayed there. I know survivors who have never been fortunate enough to feel the freedom that comes from putting the burden of suffering down in order to be able to bear up their happiness. Even for me, it took many years to realise that as long as I still held fear and pain in my heart, I would not truly be free.” ~ Eddie Jaku

In truth, Eddie was not able to do this right away. He shared about getting married shortly after becoming free and how miserable he was. He was broken and easily scarred for life from what he had experienced personally and the cruelty that he had seen others do to them.

It wasn’t until the day that his son was born that the suffering broke and he was able to feel happy and full of hope again.

As I sat in my comfy chair, drinking my coffee, and reading this morning, I realized how much of my past is still living with me as I head into my day today. It is obviously nothing like the stories in this book… but regardless, there are regrets, stories, and experiences that are replaying… dampening my mood… getting to live again and again and again.

What if we didn’t bring any of our past forward into today? What would today feel like? What would be possible?

And if there are unresolved issues from the past that are truly important, then we bring our full consciousness to them with the intention of resolving them. We don’t let these stories spin willy-nilly in our brains evoking all kinds of old emotions causing us to relive experiences that we have already survived!

Instead, let’s start fresh today.

What does TODAY really feel like? What possibilities are in the ethers for us?

What amazing new adventure can we get up to?

How would we love to spend our 16 waking hours of today?

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