Even though I’ve had the same home for thirty years, I’ve lived a life with a lot of coming and going. I used to travel across the country a couple of times a year, missing a whole month or a season at home. When I first had a year that I didn’t have to drive across the country and back, I was startled to realize: It’s been a whole year! I’ve been able to wake up every morning in the same bed, and see every day of every season from the same vantage point. And now I realize it’s been nine years since I’ve driven across the country, and four years since I’ve really done much more than wake up, meditate, fill the day with work, gardening, communication, punctuate it with my little lunch ritual, my little evening ritual, and then go to bed. This repeating pattern brings a pure, deep contentment to each day.

Contentment was an aspiration since I moved to this home. I remember sitting on the rim of the canyon thirty years ago and feeling a voice inside, This is the leading edge of peace. Since then, I’ve touched into contentment occasionally, recognized it in a moment here or there, felt it for a day or two. But a few weeks ago, it began to bubble up in me day after day after day, an inexplicable feeling of quiet happiness. As I reflected, it came clear that it arose from the simple sameness of each day; and yet, within each day, the infinite variety.

There is a routine that shifts gradually from season to season, and varies only occasionally. I work from deadline to deadline on a wonderful variety of projects. But I don’t ever really know what’s coming next. I don’t know whether it’s going to be sunny and I’ll have a long walk—where will we walk? Or if it’s going to be icy and I’ll stay inside and vacuum, or write or read, or work. There is spontaneous variety in what I choose to eat and how I choose to prepare it on any given day. Who might call for advice or help or consolation, or to share some good news I can rejoice in with them? I don’t know what opportunities will arise to be of service in my community, or in the larger political landscape. 

Contentment doesn’t mean that I’m never sad. I am finally able to understand, to feel in my whole being, that contentment can also hold my sadness: personal sadness with fading friendships, an aging body that’s rarely felt robustly healthy in its entire life, occasional loneliness, or the deeply held grief over dead beloveds; and a more global sadness at the dreadful state of so many aspects of our world. 

Why has it taken me until this age to begin to feel so deeply content? Why was I not able to feel this contentment earlier in life, and why am I now? I guess because it took me this long to learn the ingredients of the magic formula…