“If we might see the miracle of a single flower clearly, our complete life would change.” ~Buddha
There are seasons when life feels stripped of pleasure, when hope appears distant, unreachable, or unreal. Seasons if you get up already exhausted, and it appears like there’s nothing tender left on the planet—no magnificence, no connection, nothing to relaxation in. I’ve been residing in that season currently.
I’m dropping my imaginative and prescient to macular degeneration. I’m a caregiver for my ninety-six-year-old mom. I’m navigating incapacity, monetary pressure, and the sensation that the long run is shrinking as a substitute of widening. Most days, I transfer by the world numb and drained, attempting to recollect who I was.
I hold looking for one thing to carry on to, however pleasure appears like vapor—one thing I can see briefly however not contact. One thing different folks have. One thing I can’t appear to reside in.
Each Different Friday
Twice a month, I’m going to my eye physician for injections that sluggish the lack of my imaginative and prescient. The ready room is all the time full of quiet pressure—fearful eyes, deep breaths, folks attempting to not crumble. I sit and breathe, ready for my identify to be known as.
And each time, with out fail, there’s a girl—possibly in her late fifties or early sixties—who enters already livid. Earlier than she even sits down, she’s preventing with the receptionist.
“That is ridiculous. I’ve been ready eternally. None of you recognize what you’re doing!”
If somebody steps too near the counter, she lashes out:
“Don’t you dare lower in entrance of me!”
She screams into her cellphone, cursing the driving force who introduced her there without cost. She talks loudly about how the world has deserted her. As soon as, she turned to me and mentioned:
“Individuals such as you don’t know what it’s like. You’re privileged. You don’t care.”
Everybody within the room freezes. Heads sink. Our bodies tighten. The air turns sharp. It appears like all security disappears.
Every time I witness her rage, a quiet thought echoes inside me: Is that this what we’ve develop into? A world with out empathy, with out heat, with out pleasure?
It jogs my memory of what so many people are feeling at the moment—an awesome sense of isolation, worry, and disconnection. A society the place folks carry a lot ache that anger turns into the one language they’ve left.
And I really feel it inside myself too.
A Second That Modified One thing
However lately, one thing occurred that shifted the way in which I noticed the whole lot.
Just a few days earlier than certainly one of my appointments, I used to be sitting with my mom. I don’t bear in mind what we had been speaking about—one thing small, odd. However abruptly, we each laughed. Not a well mannered giggle or a small smile. An actual giggle—full, stunning, alive.
I heard the enjoyment in her voice. I noticed her face gentle up. I felt my chest soften and my shoulders loosen. I felt a launch of pressure I didn’t even notice I used to be holding. For a couple of seconds, I felt a deep, fleeting happiness.
And whereas it was taking place, I knew the second was particular. It arrived abruptly and disappeared rapidly, nevertheless it was actual. And it jogged my memory that I’m nonetheless able to pleasure—that my coronary heart isn’t damaged past restore, simply drained.
Seeing Her In a different way
So after I returned to the attention clinic and the offended girl erupted into the room once more—shouting, cursing, accusing—one thing shifted.
I checked out her, and as a substitute of feeling threatened, I noticed somebody drowning in ache. Somebody whose struggling has nowhere to go. Somebody who may not have laughed in years. Somebody deserted by a world that retains transferring with out her.
Her anger wasn’t energy. It was heartbreak in disguise. It was grief with no place to land.
And I spotted that she will not be the issue—she is the symptom.
A symptom of a society the place folks really feel unseen, the place struggling is ignored, the place worry turns into louder than compassion, and the place pleasure is handled like a luxurious as a substitute of nourishment.
Hope Is Not a Grand Emotion
I used to assume hope meant a serious turning level—a dramatic transformation, a transparent second of redemption. I assumed pleasure wanted to be huge to matter.
Now I perceive one thing totally different:
Hope is small.
Hope is temporary.
Hope is quiet.
Hope is a spark, not a hearth.
Hope is listening to your mom giggle.
Hope is a breath that loosens pressure.
Hope is noticing a second whereas it’s taking place.
Hope is refusing to let ache outline the story.
One Small Second Can Save Us
The world might really feel joyless at occasions. It might really feel harsh and divided. It might really feel filled with anger like the girl within the ready room. However each time somebody laughs—each time somebody softens—each time a second breaks by the darkness, it proves one thing important:
Life remains to be right here. Pleasure remains to be doable. The guts nonetheless remembers.
We don’t have to attend for the whole lot to be okay to permit one thing small to matter.
A Observe for When Hope Feels Gone
Shut your eyes for a second. Take a sluggish breath.
Keep in mind one second—nonetheless tiny—if you felt heat or connection.
Amusing. A smile. A handheld. Daylight in your face. Something.
Maintain that reminiscence gently for 5 breaths. Watch what occurs inside you.
That feeling is the seed of therapeutic.
A query: When was the final time you felt even a small spark of pleasure?
What would occur in case you let that second matter?
My reply: I heard my mom giggle. And at the moment, I’m selecting to let that be sufficient.
About Tony Collins
Edward “Tony” Collins, EdD, MFA, is a documentary filmmaker, author, educator, and incapacity advocate residing with progressive imaginative and prescient loss from macular degeneration. His work explores presence, caregiving, resilience, and the quiet energy of small moments. He’s presently finishing books on artistic scholarship and collaborative documentary filmmaking and shares private essays about which means, hope, and incapacity on Substack.
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