Small Things

Take a moment and do something small.

Small things. Smiling at a stranger. Picking up a piece of trash. Taking a moment to notice the clouds. Feeling your lover's hand. Touching their face. Holding their gaze.

This morning I set out two small bottles of Gatorade for our wonderful Austin Sanitation workers. You would have thought they won a prize. “It’s a small thing,” I said. “It’s a big thing to us,” they replied.

Small things. Making your bed. Folding your laundry. Cleaning a glass. Clearing a plate. Saying hello to a neighbor. Just for a moment, get quiet and listen to your heartbeat. The wind. The air conditioner in your car. You can hear it because you’re alive.

Hello to the Walmart Greeter. Thank you for keeping us safe to the police officer. Thank you for your service, to the soldier. Thank you for risking your life to keep us alive to the first responders. I appreciate you, to the mail delivery person. Thank you for delivering this package to me, to the Amazon driver. Thank you to the Domino’s Pizza person. To the DoorDash driver. Thank you to the Lyft and Uber drivers. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Small, quiet moments of gratitude.

Where are you now? Are you worried? Why? Are you concerned? Of what? Are you angry? At whom? Take a moment and change the channel. Make a small shift in your thinking, and pivot to something wonderful, sweet, happy, nice, and fun. This is your life. Change the future. A small pivot, just enough to create the space for something positive to emerge.

Breathe, my friend. It’s okay. We’re all there. With you. This is a good time to take a deep breath. To breathe. To feel the air flow through your nose, fill your lungs, and escape through your mouth in one life-affirming cycle. Can you do that? Just one conscious breath?

You can’t do it wrong. And it doesn’t matter what the “it” is. You just can’t do it wrong. Not if you truly knew that everything is connected and is here in form as an expression of, well, all that is. And if that’s too much to wrap your head around, pick a flower. Play in the snow. Dip your toe in the ocean. Yell as loud as you can into a pillow. Listen to children. It really doesn’t matter what you do, simply by you being alive, you’ve been invited to experience this miracle we all share.

Small things. With intention. Without a goal. Without a reason. Just because.

Small things. Know in your heart-of-hearts that you are loved. That’s huge.