When glancing through photos I’d taken of my granddaughter, this one caught my eye as a moment of joy and praise.

I have no idea what she was thinking. I snapped photo after photo, hoping to capture a few images that reflected her personality at this fun age.

A few frames later, I found this one:

Isn’t that the way we are at times? We can go from joy to sadness within moments. We can feel great then feel miserable in the blink of an eye. We can praise God then pout about the way things are. We can be grateful then jealous or selfish.

Keep each experience and emotion in context. Each is a snapshot. Back up and look at the string of images. What are you consistently choosing? How are you repeatedly responding? How are you doing life with others? Where are you heading?

What adjustments do you need to make? Refuse to put on a happy face and pretend it’s all okay. Instead of appearing as if things are better or rationalizing they’re better when you’re only changing your standards to justify where you are, actually work to get better. Become better. It starts today. You’ll still have some snapshots of sadness, discomfort, confusion, and discontentment, but you’ll have a progression of snapshots that point toward a future of hope and joy, gratitude and praise.