Learning from decorating

I suppose everything in life helps us to see life in new ways.

Decorating my apartment has been instructive to me.

For instance, I am one of these people who loves everything done right away. When I wanted that beautiful handmade quilt that Margaret sent hung on a wall of my office, I couldn't wait. I had to wait, yet it became so important to me that the quilt would grace that wall.

And it certainly has graced that wall and the whole room.

Just yesterday, an old friend, Judy, who had never been here before, walked into my office and stopped in her tracks when she saw the quilt on the wall facing her. She paled. She was stunned by its beauty. She almost choked on her words.  "Where did you get that? That is the most beautiful quilt I ever saw. The colors. The pattern..."

There is not a minute when I am in the office that I don't feel nourished by the quilt and glad that I can look at it.

At the same time, that the quilt is up where I wanted it doesn't feel as momentous as it did when I was aching for it to be up. In fact, sometimes I miss being able to pick the quilt up, even just hold it, have my fingers run over it, or to feel the comfort of having it cover me on the couch. I miss all that.

Am I never fully satisfied? Am I more fulfilled in anticipation than in actuality? Is this human nature or just me?

Right now, in my same impatience, I'm waiting for two white round Chinese lanterns to arrive. They should be here any day now. One paper lantern will go over the round dining table, and one will become the living-room ceiling light.  I can hardly wait. It is as if the world depends on it. It is as if I can't live without the Chinese lanterns!

At the same time, I can surmise that the joy of having the Chinese lanterns instead of the humdrum lighting will fade.  The lanterns will just turn into light fixtures. I will like them, even love them, and yet there is nothing like the anticipation of them.

What do I really think the lanterns will do for me?

Two points:

1. Our physical surroundings aren't really all that important to our happiness.  Whether we live in a palace or an ordinary apartment, after a while, it just comes down to shelter and just living your life to the same degree you lived it before.

2. There is a tendency to take things for granted. This goes beyond decorating of course.

Do you remember the beautiful painted cloth that the children from an orphanage in India sent to Heavenletters?  It says: "Joy is in us, not things."

Even with the people who are most important to us, after a while, we kind of expect our loved ones to be around, and our hearts don't beat quite so fast as they once did.

Ultimately our happiness does not depend on housing, not the city we live in, not our wealth, not our age, not our loved ones, not on anything external. Our happiness depends on ourselves. It always comes down to ourselves.

Everything seems to come down to ourselves.  Even with that realization, what do we do now?