A Fruitful Release Ends in Ease

I’ve noticed that if I return from grocery shopping with grapes and then store them in a refrigerator drawer in their original packaging, it is unlikely that my family members will consume them.  

However, if I rinse the grapes, cut the stems a bit, and place them in an open container on an eye-level refrigerator shelf, those snack-sized bunches of grapes will be devoured.

It really doesn’t take much time to make grapes ready to eat, yet my boys would never unpack and prepare them that way without being prompted, as it takes a few extra steps. 

I can’t fault them for this…most of us enjoy experiences more when they are easily accessible or user-friendly. 

As I watched my family easily consume the freshly prepared grapes, I realized that EASE is something I want to create more of in the midst of our complicated world. 

The question of course is, HOW can we create more ease in our lives? 

Surprisingly, the thinking that accompanied this “fruitful” moment provides the answer. 

While my family noshed on clean grapes and I pondered how I can experience more ease, I paid attention to a thought that played in my mind. Admittedly, it was laced with some spite; it said, “It must be nice having ease created for you.” 

As with many ideas that float through our minds, this thought captured only half the truth of what I was feeling. 

Sure, it accurately revealed that I might not have been the beneficiary of ease in that moment, but more importantly, it failed to acknowledge that my family does create ease for me in other situations.

This dangerous thought is quite instructive: had I clung to it, I probably would have ended up with some difficulty, clearly the opposite of ease. Specifically, I likely would have developed a whole story rooted in resentment about situations where others do not make things easy for me.

Herein lies the thing that allows us to create more ease in our lives, whether it pertains to snacking or any other situation: we must release the stories that our mind clings to because they are often not true. 

Simply by acknowledging—but not following—the trail of thoughts that creep into even the most mundane situations, we can create ease, and dare I say greater freedom (the real reason why we desire ease) for ourselves.

Such discipline requires taking just a few extra moments to clean, detangle, and make visible the often unhelpful thoughts to which we wrongly attach. 
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Why not start the new year with trying this process…at the very least, it might motivate you to move grapes out of the refrigerator drawer!

JANUARY 7, 2021