30 Days of Joy: The Purest Sleep You Can Experience

Note: What you’re about to read is the next step in my challenge to find joy in something — anything — every day for 30 days. This entry is part 3.

I’ve turned into my mother.

My mother can fall asleep anywhere at any time. And often does.

The true test of a movie or TV show’s quality is not how it’s rated by Rotten Tomatoes’ top critics, but if it’s interesting enough to keep my mom conscious for its full run time.

And now, you can add my consciousness to that litmus test.

The combination of age, genes and an earlier-than-ever wake-up time has finally caught up with me.

It’s frustrating, because I’ve always been a night owl — and liked it. I love staying up late, when everyone’s gone to bed and you have the house to yourself.

But more often than not, before the evening hour hits double digits, I’m sinking into the couch, my breathing becoming heavier as my eyelids give into gravity.

This scene occurred last night, as my wife and I watched the “Scrubs” reruns we’d recorded.

And to be honest, I loved it.

Not the fact that I now have the bedtime of a 68-year-old grandmother.

But the actual sleep itself.

That sleep is the purest, most restful sleep I experience, even though it lasts a matter of minutes.

I don’t know why that is, but my best guess is because it happens naturally, without effort and without expectation. There’s no trying, no doing, no conscious directing.

There’s only the act of letting go, of giving into the moment.

And it’s only in the moment — this moment — where pure joy resides.

*****

This originally appeared on 100 Naked Words.