{"id":1383,"date":"2022-12-09T13:56:10","date_gmt":"2022-12-09T19:56:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/?p=1383"},"modified":"2022-12-09T13:56:10","modified_gmt":"2022-12-09T19:56:10","slug":"joys-and-sorrows","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/?p=1383","title":{"rendered":"Joys and Sorrows"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>By Nino Ridgway<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I\u2019ve been thinking a lot about our sharing of Joys and Sorrows.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Many years ago I was in a very tough place in my life.&nbsp; I had been badly betrayed by people who had been the foundation of my existence, and I was so full of sorrow I thought I might break.&nbsp; Getting through each day was a monumental effort, like walking miles in waist deep water.&nbsp; I began attending Madison Friends Meeting, where I sat in the back and wept.&nbsp; A Friend noticed my sadness and reached out to me, and I am forever grateful to her for her kindness and wisdom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I lived near the Arboretum, and one windy, clear, cold December night I couldn\u2019t stand to be indoors anymore.&nbsp; As I walked out into the Arboretum I was suddenly filled with gratitude for everything that was RIGHT with my life.&nbsp; I shouted up to the moon \u201cThank you for my housemates!\u201d&nbsp; The wind carried my gratitude away.&nbsp; Then \u201cThank you for this cold clear night!\u201d&nbsp; \u201cI\u2019m grateful that I am healthy!\u201d&nbsp; \u201cThank you for my parents, my brother, my sister.\u201d&nbsp; \u201cI\u2019m so happy for my fellow students and my major professor who all have my back.\u201d&nbsp; \u201cI\u2019m so thankful I have a car and a bicycle.\u201d&nbsp; And on and on and on it went, faster and faster, each new gratitude tripping hard on the heels of the one before.&nbsp; I was grateful for EVERYTHING!&nbsp; I started laughing.&nbsp; Later I went back home, smiling, and slept well.&nbsp; Somehow from this great sadness I had discovered a road to joy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In the days ahead, there was plenty more debilitating depression.&nbsp; Sorrow sometimes felt overwhelming and all-encompassing to me, like nothing would ever be right again.&nbsp; But when I remembered to give thanks for all that was right in my life, the sorrow didn\u2019t seem all that big. In one way or another I have continued to this day the practice of giving thanks.&nbsp; It is one way for me to stoke the fires of the Light Within.&nbsp; Sometimes I shout it.&nbsp; Sometimes I whisper. &nbsp;Sometimes I just hold it in my heart.&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A friend noticed my sadness and reached out to me.<\/p>\n<p>Photo by Mike Soika<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":1386,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[100],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1383","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-december-2022"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1383","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1383"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1383\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1387,"href":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1383\/revisions\/1387"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1383"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1383"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareletter.milwaukeequakers.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1383"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}