The truth is, the little things matter. 

Like the fact that you put on earrings today.  Yup, I noticed. 

When you rested your hand gently on your friend’s shoulder. Yup, she felt it. 

That extra $2 you added to the tip just because.  Yup, noted. 

All those diapers you changed, the accounts you reconciled, the phone calls you answered.  Each one of those tiny things you do adds up to a life lived.  

It’s the little choices you make.  The music you listen to in the car.  Putting flowers on the table even if you’re the only one there to see them.  The energetic boundary you set before the meeting.  The breath you take before you start talking loudly.  The pink soap and sponges you buy for your kitchen sink.

Those little choices shape the trajectory of your whole life.  

Before I sat down to write this missive, I gave this room a quick tidy.  I picked up a dozen little horses, a garlic press, and stacks of tissues.  I think the tissues were beds for the horses.  The garlic press is a mystery. 

Yesterday I entered all my purchases into YNAB, my budgeting software, just like I did all the days before that, and just like I will today heaven help me. 

Sometimes it seems like my life is made up of prosaic chores.  

So many of the things that make my life beautiful aren’t beautiful in and of themselves.  

But I do them anyway, because that sort of unsexy maintenance yields the things I want. 

Sometimes making a gorgeous life is not glamorous work.  It involves repetition, and humility, and sometimes tearing your hair out.  But it yields joy.  Beauty.  Order.  Serenity. 

But the good news is that it’s not a one-time event.  We get a million chances.  A bazillion moments to keep turning toward big rich juicy starry beauty.

We don’t do the little things because we’re trying to get every single thing DONE.  We aren’t shooting for some magazine-spread static perfection.  And we’re definitely not trying to camouflage or fix all these horrible, mortifying, irretrievable flaws in us that needed to be fixed.     

Fuck that shit. 

We do them for one reason only.  For joy. 

I am a shameless glutton for joy, for beauty, and for laughter.  And so even the unromantic parts of my life take on a little humble glow.  Because they’re all about creating beauty. 

The little things you do, they matter. 

So what small thing would make the biggest impact for you today?  This week?  This year? 

What one small shift, if you started it today, would revolutionize your life if you kept at it?  

Now what if you went and did it just for today?  

Magic.  It’s in the little things. 

much love, 

Anna