What I Learned About Happiness from a Pile of Sticks

And some life updates

I won’t lie, readers, times have been turbulent. With my two step-daughters, now 14 and 16, happily returning to Denmark this summer to finish their secondary education in the (fabulous) Danish system, my husband and I are left to reevaluate our remaining mini-family and whereabouts.  

No longer tied to local public schools, we’re free to explore the world with our almost-three-year-old when and if my husband is able to switch to fully remote work at his American company.

Choices are great, they tell us. But they can also be crippling. I often wonder if Danes are happier because so many choices in their society are pre-made for them. It was not until moving to Denmark that I realized that it was a good thing. 

With any luck, my dream plan will work out and I’ll have some happy updates soon. If not, an existential crisis might be coming. 

In the midst of all this, I continue to think and read about happiness. Especially in the midst of all this. Hyper aware that wherever you go, there you are, I’m under no illusion that changing locations will “fix” me. But I do believe that it can make our life less stressful which would be a great start.

The more I think about moving the more I remind myself of the necessity of being in the moment and appreciating what I have. It’s so easy to daydream your weeks away when changes are on the horizon!

Just this week, I caught a beautiful moment that reminded me of what life was all about. 

At a playground with my daughter, I sat in the sand while she collected sticks for our new favorite activity - building a “house.” As you know, I’ve been trying to introduce her to nature in any way I can. Inspired by Scandinavian nature education, I’m a firm believer that children need to be outdoors as much as possible, in any weather. I’ve pretty much grown obsessed with the idea but that’s a story for another time. 

So there I was, building a “house,” distracted and checking emails on my phone when a 5-year-old boy came up to us and asked me what we were doing.

“Building a house out of sticks,” I answered.

He watched me in silence for a minute, then asked: “Can you show me how to do that?”

He went on to collect “building materials” from all over the playground, bringing me a dirty leftover food container (thanks, people who couldn’t make it to the trash can) and a few more pieces of garbage, among other things. 

For the next 15 minutes, we built and re-built, while the boy’s nanny watched his siblings. 

For those 15 minutes, I was the happiest I’ve been all day (or week?). Phone put away, fully immersed in a nature-building activity, while actually making a tiny difference in someone’s life (other than my daughter’s). At the end of it all, the boy declare us his “friends” (he had 6, including us, he counted) and asked me to text his nanny a photo of our little stick village. 

I walked home ecstatic. Just 15 minutes of being truly present and looking at things through the eyes of a child left me feeling higher than my double-shot morning latte. 

Now, if only I could put my phone away every time I’m out with my own daughter. I must have missed out on quite a few of these moments, I sadly realized.

So go outside! Sit on the grass or the sand. Put your phone away. Find a reason to build a house out of sticks. Or stones. Or small pieces of garbage if you must. Enjoy!