81 days to go...

I woke up early this morning, and I could capture the freshness in the air. In the garden, nature was wide awake. The rays of the sun filtered through the leaves of palms and ferns.

While doing my daily dao yin exercises at the side of the pool, I felt new energy make its way through my body. And it brought me my message for the day: that I don’t have to live with pressure.

I knew that I can’t blame anyone or anything for pressure that I feel. It arises in me, it’s my own creation. Dealing with it is therefore my own responsibility too. I would be much better off without it.

I made a simple decision on the spot, to live the day with joy and without pressure. I knew that if I could pay attention to the present moments during the day, I could let go of tension and pressure as it arose. And I did.

During lunch time, a colleague asked me about my day, and I said that I had a lot of work to do, but that I had decided to live the day joyfully. She nodded and said that happiness is a choice we can make everyday.

Smiling helps to do this, I found. People often expect to smile when they are happy. But my Tao teacher taught me that smiling triggers happiness, as well as good health. With a smile we can be happy without any particular reason.

What keeps me from smiling is that I worry too much. I recently asked my 7-year old daughter to remind me when I am too serious (and when I don’t sit with my back straight). She does so frequently and I love that.

I reflected this morning that my worries and concerns are mostly the result of attaching too much to something, be it a possession or a thought. One of my lessons in the past month was that nothing belongs to me, so why do I keep attaching so much? I am just the custodian of what is entrusted to me, not the owner.

Attachment is so powerful that Buddhists say that it starts a new life, of the non-desirable kind, continuing the cycle of samsara. The desire to hold on to something and call it “mine” creates a new life of its own. But it is based on the illusion that the things we have and hold dear are actually ours, and that our identity depends on them.

Reality is otherwise. None of the things I attach to are part of my identity. I have nothing that is Me. I already am Me, and I need nothing more to be Me. So I can forget about the worries. Open up with joy, because there is nothing to loose apart from illusions.

I put my trust in this message that I received this morning in my garden, and I used it during the day. It worked fine. Whenever I started to get serious to the point of being worried, I reminded myself to live with joy in stead.

I left office earlier than usual and made new friends at the opening of an exhibition of Asian Contemporary Art in Print, organized to mark the 50th anniversary of the Asia Society. A joyful day by choice.

Photographs: Christmas decoration on Ayala Avenue (above); The Drawing Room - Contemporary Art, cohost of the Asia Society exhibition (below)