Happy Mom Tip #48: Memorize Two Lines from a Poem

We often forget that inspiration — along with its cousins elevation and awe — are positive emotions that make us feel more content, joyful and satisfied with our lives. One way to bring more of these positive emotions into our lives is to memorize a part of a poem that inspires us.

This is one of my favorite Mary Oliver poems:

Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.

You do not have to walk on your knees

For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body

love what it loves.

Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.

Meanwhile the world goes on.

Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain

are moving across the landscapes,

over the prairies and the deep trees,

the mountains and the rivers.

Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,

are heading home again.

Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –

over and over announcing your place

in the family of things.

The lines I say to myself for inspiration are, “the world offers itself to your imagination, calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting — over and over announcing your place in the family of things.”

Use the Internet to find a poem you remember loving. Print it out, highlight your favorite lines, and commit them to memory.

Christine Carter, Ph.D., is a coach and the author of RAISING HAPPINESS: 10 Simple Steps for More Joyful Kids and Happier Parents.  A sociologist at UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center, her goal is to help parents bring more joy into their own lives and the lives of their children.

photo courtesy of Torsten Mangner via Creative Commons