Each year as summer wanes and relief from the relentless, sweltering summer is finally offered, I am reminded of how easy it is to slip into a numbing commentary around the weather. I am also reminded of the phrases, “what you appreciate, appreciates,” and “what you focus on expands.” I understand the value of greasing the social wheel and mindless conversations about the weather are about the best WD40 you can find when it comes to lubricating a conversation with a stranger. But I am asking myself to look more closely at those automatic conversations we use to fill the space between us. Are they really adding anything to the quality of my life? What if I focused on something else that lightened up the energy instead? Imagine what life would be like if we stopped doing and saying the things that prolonged our suffering?

During the hottest days of July, my siblings and I pulled together to relocate my father into an assisted living facility. It was an enormous task that required more time and money than I felt I could afford. From my point of view, the expanding needs of my father were clearly not going to go away. My life felt like an REM song– I was certain it was “the end of the world, as I knew it!”

Rather predictably, I had an epiphany! In those darkest moments, I realized I had a choice. I could either complain about the circumstances around me, or choose to make my own. Like the weather, the conditions around my father’s care were not going to go away. I could choose to do what needed to be done from a place of joy and generosity, or I could suffer. It was that simple.

Am I successful at choosing joy and generosity over negativity and suffering every day of the week, in every circumstance? No. But I do understand at a much deeper level the level of choice each and every one of us has, at each and every moment.

Lori Darley is a Certified Somatic Coach and Associate for the Strozzi Institute. Lori founded The Transitions Coach in 1998 and has coached organizations and individuals, supporting her clients in reaching peak performance through dynamic communication, conflict resolution and leadership skills. Visit The Transitions Coach website.