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Mastering new tasks brings joy By Sharon Johnson Jul 10, 2022 12:15 AM A A Lately I find the most unexpected things give me joy. As illustration, I was having trouble printing a document I intended to send to my oldest granddaughter. It seems like such a simple task: Just press “print” on the computer’s dashboard, and a minute later a hard copy of the document you just created spews out on the nearby copy machine. Except this time it didn’t. The screen announced: “The printer is offline” and then “The printer is unavailable.” What?! It is definitely available. I can see it from here. The green light is on. Determined not to be frustrated by life’s minor irritations, I fiddled with the settings but had no success. Then I resorted to what our son always refers to as “The University of YouTube.” And there was a suggested remedy. “Unplug the printer. Wait 30 seconds. Plug it back in.” And ... it worked! The feeling of utter satisfaction I realized from that little problem-solving exercise was unexpected. The word “satisfaction” does not do the moment justice. This was a feeling of complete joy. I have experienced similar joyous reactions over the past few weeks as I have found myself confronted with household challenges I previously relied on my husband to address — and now I am succeeding in figuring them out, resolving them. I “fixed” the non-functioning ice maker on our refrigerator. Granted, our visiting son talked me through that issue, but now I know what to do. I have a new respect for independently “knowing what to do” and then doing it. Differently put, figuring it out can be exhilarating. The clinical psychologist and author Mary Pipher is a friend of mine. Not in the way that you might think, where her name shows up on my iPhone contacts and I call her weekly, but in the sense that I read whatever she writes, and it sustains me. It brings me joy. Her most recent book is “A Life in Light: Meditations on Impermanence.” She is the writer who suggests: “Be the person you want to live with every day of your life.” Actually I think it was her grandmother who instilled that in her, and she passes along the wisdom. Her advice speaks to me. I am in my mid-70s and, at the moment, taking stock of what’s next in my life. I want to move through this new stage of elderhood embracing skills I did not realize I needed to have. I want to retain full independence in my activities of daily living and my life in general — for as long as possible. I know that does not just happen. I need both intention, a solid plan of action and follow-through. If I want to move through the remainder of my life with competence and a joyful heart, I need to start today. And so I shall — with a little help from Mary Pipher who writes about Vietnamese Buddhist monk and zen master Thich Nhat Hanh, who experienced and witnessed great suffering. He practiced mindfulness and deep breathing to calm himself. He would chant “Present moment. Beautiful moment.” So be it. Sharon Johnson is a retired educator. Reach her at [email protected]