I went to see Brad Paisley in concert over the weekend.  For those of you who don’t know, according to purists, he sings “that new country stuff.”  While I am a huge country fan, my date was not.  My husband was hearing most of the songs for the first time that night.  I was swept away by the show.  The energy was electric and never dropped.  The band was tight and very professional.  The staging was clean and effective; the pacing spot-on.  Paisley never stopped – he was playing guitar and/or singing the entire 90 minutes that he was on stage.  And his energy was contagious – I never even thought about sitting down either!  While he was obviously working very hard, it was also clear that he was loving every minute of it.  When the lights came up, I looked at my husband not really knowing what he’d say, to hear, “That was a great show!”

 

And it was a great show.  If it had just been me, “the fan,” who’d enjoyed it, it would have been easy to give the credit to the music.  But it wasn’t.  The fact that my husband was also caught up in the show really says something.  What was it that night that was so captivating?  What was it about Brad Paisley that dwarfed his incredibly talented opening act, Darius Rucker, within seconds?  While both are successful, talented musicians, it was evident that night that one was born to perform.  I think the magic of that show lay in the opportunity to watch someone do what they clearly love doing -- and doing it very, very well.  I think you can’t help but be moved when witnessing someone enjoy the heck out of their work.

 

Not many of us get to pack thousands into arenas to witness our work.  But we all have the chance to enjoy what we do every single day.  And when our work and our pleasure intersect, it makes for some real magic.  Since the weekend, I’ve been paying close attention and have been moved by many people who’ve crossed my path.  There’s the wise and funny eye doctor, who actually manages to make my son’s appointments (complete with pupil dilation) enjoyable.  He clearly loves his job and his enthusiasm is infectious.  There’s the Marine I got to talk to on Monday, whose enthusiasm and joy about his chosen path in life actually made me, who has never-for-a-second been interested in anything military, want to walk a day in his shoes.  There’s the preacher I regularly get to listen to, who can not only craft a tight, thoughtful sermon, but who can deliver it with charisma and passion – managing to teach while seeming to entertain.  There’s the father next door who takes such palpable pleasure in spending time with his children.  There’s my favorite check-out person at the grocery store who takes obvious pride in perfectly packing each of my bags as if they were an elaborate jigsaw puzzle.

 

All these people, Brad Paisley included, share something.  It’s not just that they’ve discovered their gifts and talents and are using them.  While they are each talented in their own way, it wasn’t actually this that captured my attention.  It’s the joy they receive from their activities that first made me notice them.  It is the pleasure they take in what they do that is notable.  And that is something we can all aspire to.

 

That is something we can actually practice.  On our yoga mats we learn to search for the pleasure in what can be at times be very hard work.  While I easily enjoy every breath I take in a stretch that comes naturally to me, I have found that I can also learn to enjoy the breaths I take in postures that are really hard for me.  More importantly, I’ve learned that finding this enjoyment is the key to my body eventually opening deeper into the stretch.  It’s only when I begin to find some pleasure in the work of the yoga posture that I can balance the effort of being there with some release.  And anyone who has stepped onto a yoga mat knows that while effort is crucial, it is only through release that we get deeper into any of yoga’s stretches.  I once had a teacher who loved to remind us to smile.  She would inevitably do this during the most grueling posture of the class – boat pose, say, or an extended stay in low plank.  She taught me that, while it doesn’t change the nature of the effort required, adding a smile sure makes the experience more enjoyable.

 

Learning to find pleasure in the things we do – from the easy stuff to the hard; from the things we love to the things we’d much rather skip – brings us one step closer to living the joy-full, rewarding lives we all aspire to.  When we learn to spend more time at the intersection of pleasure and work, not only do we do what we do better, but our experiences are exponentially richer.  It’s when we’re at the intersection of pleasure and work that we shine the brightest – and that is magical whether we have an audience of one or one million.

 

Namaste,

Amy

 

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