Sunny Side Up

July 9, 2017, La Muse, 9:22 AM

“How would you like your eggs this morning? Scrambled? Over hard? Over easy? Sunny-side up?”

Just like ordering eggs, we have the choice to order up our day.

Okay. I know: “Sunny-side up” sounds Pollyanna¹-esque. And, in some ways it is. The girl wasn’t all wrong though. She chose to look at things from a positive perspective. She. Chose. To.

Look, we can order our eggs scrambled, or over-hard, or even over-easy. Most definitely! But do we want our day to be scrambled? Over hard? A little bit runny?

I’m not so sure I do. In fact, I’m positive I don’t.²

As I once heard: We are not responsible for our first thought. But we are responsible for the next one. And, if we can’t get our minds to think a more positive, productive thought, we can certainly take a counter-action. That could be as simple as sitting still, being quiet, and choosing to do nothing more for whatever amount of time we deem sufficient. Or it could be going for a walk, doing yoga, making a cup of tea, phoning a friend, or doing what is right in front of us that needs to be done – perhaps with an attitude of “So what? I’m going to do it anyway.”³

True story:

Once upon a time, about 14 years ago, I was literally stuck in Palm Springs, CA (the story of why I was “stuck” I can tell you at another time; and many of you may wonder how anyone can feel stuck in Palm Springs, CA. Well, you can. In August when the temperature is hovering at about 112◦ F for days on end). I had been in the situation I was in for about a week, feeling like it had been at least a month! I was complaining about it at a 7 AM AA meeting one morning. After the meeting a woman walked up to me and offered:

“What if you woke up with joyful anticipation, Nicky, and asked the question, ‘What have you got in store for me today, God?’*

I had to admit, I hadn’t thought about taking a different approach to my situation. I hadn’t realized I had been ordering my eggs over-hard for the entire week of my captivity. Ordering sunny-side up was actually the cure I needed to remedy my discontent. Food is the best medicine – and this was food for thought!

The truth is we can reframe our perspective, change our thinking every moment of every day. We have the choice to do that. We may not be able to change our circumstances but we can change how we respond to them.

¹ A Pollyanna is described as someone who remembers only happy events, believes everyone in the world is completely beautiful, and looks on the bright side of everything, including misfortune (based on the namesake title of the 1913 book by Eleanor H. Porter)

² Is this a number or asterisk?! – note about Thich Nhat Hahn and info about other “unwanted”/”negative” emotions and not pushing them away (being curious about them, acknowledging them, taking them to tea…)

³ Suggestion from the muse Bea Silly, from Jill Badonsky’s book, The Nine Modern Day Muses (and a Bodyguard)

*(God is optional. Can be replaced with Universe, Higher Power, Allah, Buddha, or simply throwing the question out to the Great Wide Void – whatever floats your boat).