Embracing Delight
Delight is a word that has been at the forefront of my mind a lot over the last several years. I have learned just how important it truly is to find delight in every day, and how to be aware of its impact. It is more than just being happy about something, but is to truly let it fill your soul and make the light within you shine and spread. Some days it is hard to find delight because life feels heavy and hard. This is just a reminder that delight is there waiting for you to find it. It can change your day, change your perspective, and change your heart if you let it.
What does it mean to delight in something or someone? The true definition of the word delight is:
Delight: verb
To please (someone) greatly
Just like many of the words in the “You Are…” Series, delight is one of those words I had heard and “knew” the meaning of, but never really dove deep into. I hadn’t really paid attention to what it meant, or how it applied to me.
Over the past 10-15 years, I have struggled with anxiety. My anxiety was mostly related to health issues, and it began to manifest into physical symptoms. I tried really hard to not let it dictate my social decisions, but inside it was hard to go places without feeling like these physical symptoms were getting in the way. To others, you would have probably never known anything was wrong, but to me, it felt like I suffocating inside. I fought hard to pretend like it wasn’t a problem, but eventually, I decided to do something about it. I sought professional help from a counselor and continue to have sessions to this day.
***A quick side note and PSA: Going to therapy does not mean that you are weak. In fact, I feel it is the exact opposite. It is proof that you are learning, growing, and taking active steps to make yourself better. It is strong and shows yourself and others that you value yourself enough to try to fix the problems you might be dealing with. Therapy is a gift, I think everyone should give themselves.
Through the years of talking with my counselor, the word delight came up many many times. I heard him mention it casually at first in things like “it sounds like you were delighting in that!” Or “It seems like you were really delighting in each other.” The word stuck out to me like a light bulb going off in my mind and I felt the pull to pay attention to it. Eventually, I realized that delight for me was at the center of it all and was actually something that could turn my anxiety around.
You see, as an Enneagram 2, I am typically thinking about others or thinking about helping or creating joy for others. I try to create “delight” for other people but realized through these conversations with my therapist that the delight wasn’t really there at all. I was not delighting in my situations, and therefore was not spreading delight to others. I was sabotaging my own situations and taking away the delight, which is what I actually was craving. Once I came to this realization, a new world was opened to me that made room for me to find the delight, combat my natural tendency to fight the delight, and finally, it helped me to embrace delight.
Although this post has a lot about me, the main point is to share with you the 5 ways I have found that help me to embrace delight in my life. I hope that hearing them may help you to reflect on if you are finding delight in life and some ways you can embrace it too. You may be pushing it away like I was, and not even realize it.
5 ways to Embrace Delight:
Delight in the little things.
Delight in your people intentionally.
Practice gratitude to delight in the things that are most important to you.
Pick your battles and find delight in letting go.
Study the scripture and be filled with delight.
Let’s break these things down a little more:
Delight in the little things:
We have all heard the phrase “the little things are the big things,” and I believe this whole-heartedly. My husband and I talk about this relatively frequently and even registered for a little decorative sign that says this on our wedding registry. In those small moments, delight is easily found if you can be aware of it. Sometimes it is in a sound, a smell, or a simple morning. It could be something old and comforting, or something new and refreshing. It could be something familiar, or delight in the excitement of something coming. In our house, we try to hold on to the little things as memories or moments we will want to come back to in our minds someday. These delightful moments or “small things” can be just the thing you need to help you find the light in the darkest of days.
2. Delight in your people intentionally:
This one may be the most important of all things. I have found in past experiences that if you can stand back and observe and learn about the people most important to you, finding what brings them delight is actually not that hard. You might even find that when you bring delight into their day, you will in turn be delighted. If you have read any of my blog posts or seen them on my social media, I am an enneagram 2 and I am very much a fan of this method of personality type learning. It has opened doors about myself that have been very healing and powerful to learn about, but more importantly, it has given me so much perspective about others. I love to use the tips and information I learn about others to help give me a sense of where they might be coming from when it comes to opinions, conflicts, likes, or dislikes and use it to help shape a new perspective. This is being intentional about learning who you love. In this process of learning, I have found many little things that the people I love to delight in that I didn’t know before.
One example I’ll share is about my 5-year-old son. We all love to be delighted, but children especially can really light up when they feel loved, seen, and cared for. Quality time is a big thing for my son, and he feels so special when he gets to have that connection, even for a brief moment. Every day when I pick him up from school, I arrive a few minutes early and have to wait in the carpool line. I sit there and listen to my podcasts, answer emails, make a phone call, or try to be as productive as I can in that small window of time. One day I didn’t have time to really do anything and I watched my son’s class head out to carpool. I looked through the line and saw my sweet boy’s face light up when he saw my car and he gave me a big wave. I rolled down my window and waved back and blew him a kiss from the car. When he got in a few minutes later, he told me that he loved it when I waved back at him. It was a little bit of a gut punch because I had missed this opportunity in the past as I was working on other things. A small simple intentional act caused so much delight in him and in turn in me. From that day on, I always make sure my phone is off a little early, so I don’t miss the chance to smile, wave, and show him my delight in seeing his sweet face as he makes his way to the carpool line. He is my delight and I want him to know it. As are all the people who bring so much light to my life.
3. Practice gratitude to delight in the things that are most important to you.
In a previous blog post called “Pick Your Joy,” I discussed a little bit about a new strategy I am using to help practice intentional gratitude. It isn’t really anything groundbreaking or different from other gratitude practices, but the key for me is that it is simple. Pick your JOY…just one to focus on throughout the day. Something about that one thing being at the forefront of my mind helps me to truly be grateful for it and spend a little more time thinking about why it makes me happy. In turn, I often find that the things I am most grateful for bring me so much delight. I can focus on the feelings, sensations, and warmth they bring to my life and how full they make me. It could be people, it could be things, it could be pets or places. Spending time reflecting on what means the most in your life and the things that bring you joy also brings delight. Joy brings delight which brings gratitude.
4. Pick your battles and find delight in letting go.
All of us heard the phrase “pick your battles” at one point or another in our lives. I feel like this phrase becomes more common once we are married and definitely so once you have children, but it is such a nugget of powerful truth. I try to remind myself of this allllllll the time. In a moment of frustration about something (a cabinet left open, or dishes in the sink, messy crafts or supplies, or toys left out around the house are examples) I try to remember “pick your battles.” There are times when I stop and think, “yeah this a battle I think I want to engage in because I feel strongly about it,” and then there are other times when I think “this feels like a big deal right now, but it is not a battle worth fighting today.” Sometimes in those moments of realizing that an obstacle doesn’t have to be a battle, the release of control feels delightful.
One example is super messy things my boys love to play with such as play-doh, kinetic sand, markers, or paint. When we get these supplies out, I tend to want to put my defenses up and say “not right now” (which I think is funny since I’m a teacher and love these things at school!). I don’t want to deal with the mess and don’t want to engage in the fight over who has what color. There are times when it really isn’t a good time to start a messy project like that, but there are others when I say yes and let go. I decide to let go of the battle of the mess, and guess what usually happens…we make a huge mess, but it was delightful spending a moment being creative with my kids. It was a battle I initially wanted to pick, but that turned out to be a fun, delightful experience that was I thankful I said yes to.
5. Study the scripture and be filled with delight.
I have mentioned before in my blog called “Finding the Balance” about finding time to be quiet and read scripture. This practice has truly become one of the most delightful parts of the day. I look forward to it and find so much comfort, peace, and wisdom from scripture. My husband and I are just a couple of weeks away from completing our first year in the Bible Recap plan. We will have read the whole bible cover to cover in a year. Two things about this experience bring me delight. The first is the truth of God filling my mind every day. I try to complete this quiet time in the morning before we start the hustle and bustle of the day, but reality causes that not to happen every day. Some days it is in the carpool pick-up line (see above #2), some days it is during our after-school rest break, some times it is before bed. The time of day may be different, but the constant fact that scripture brings to light every day is that God is Good, and as Tara Leigh Cobble says at the end of each podcast, “He is where the joy is.” He fills me with delight, his words and promises fill me with hope, and I crave more of the goodness he brings to my life. The second thing that brings me delight in this experience is the knowledge I have about the past and the stories of scripture. My eyes have opened up so much about things I thought I once knew, but now I know more deeply. The Bible stories I heard as a kid or listened to in a sermon or bible study hit so much deeper now that I am an adult and a mother. The context matters, and reading the Bible in its entirety gives me more context to understand. I can’t wait to start the plan again next year and go even further in my understanding. It is a delight to study the word of God.
As I was writing these down, I didn’t want it to be a checklist of things you needed to add to your plate, but things that I find happen very naturally. We don’t need to add more things because we already feel like we have to do ALL the things. The beauty of this list is simply that these things need your awareness. If we turn our minds to delight and intentionally try to remember to find it in these areas while we are living, we will find delight much more often.
I would be remiss to say that there are days when it truly feels like no delight can be found. Those days are hard, those days are low, and those days are realistic. We all have them, and I don’t want you to think that because of these suggestions I am walking around happy-go-lucky all the time. I have days where all I want to be is sad, or angry, but these reminders help me to come back to the truth of it all. There is beauty and delight to be found if you can embrace it. It is there to take those hard days and bring back the positivity and light that is missing. In a time when our world seems like it can be hard to find delight, find it in the little things. Find it in your people, find it in your gratefulness, find it in your release of control, but most importantly find it in the Father. God has surrounded you with delight, but it is up to us to open our eyes and see it.
