Meditation on Joy

For many months now I have been praying for the peculiar blessings of constantly-experienced joy.

In the shower this morning three exquisite joys came to me and I held them for fifteen minutes, as if savoring the flavor of some rare coffee that had to be turned over in the mouth:

- The rare love of daughters that is given to certain fathers. My roommate's father is staying with us, and while he went to sleep in the guest room before I got home last night, I thought that I would surely meet him and see him smile on his daughter today.

- The special love of God for the depressed. I thought of those whose depressions have been cured by love, and those who go into depression because they sense a special need for some kind of love nowhere expressed in their every-day life.

- God's special love of monks. I thought of the smiles of monks, their modest and courageous self-discipline, downplaying themselves in order to pursue certain aims of education and activism.

I felt each of these loves like a hand soft around my heart.

Yesterday the tag on the tea-bag of Yogi Dong Quai Tea in my mug read, "Make yourself so happy that when others see you they become happy too."