It’s the Little Things
For Spirituality and the City in our Autumn 2014 issue, we asked people about ‘The Little Things’. The little things that make you happy, make you laugh or smile, or something little that someone did for you recently or that you noticed that made your day.
Emma Cooper, Student Development Advisor
“Sometimes,” said Pooh, “the smallest things take up the biggest space in your heart”.
I have just returned to Dublin after a beautiful, refreshing weekend in my parent’s home in Co. Cavan – a weekend where I took the time to appreciate the ‘little things’ in life – quality time with my parents, long walks in the countryside, connecting with nature, my Mum’s home cooking, playing hide and go seek with my niece, hugs, chocolate, basking in the warmth of the evening sunshine – these are just some of the things that made me smile this weekend.
All too often I notice that I move through life at full speed, forgetting to appreciate the ‘little things’ and not remembering that these are in fact everything I need to be happy. Instead of getting caught up in what I don’t have and striving to achieve something or other, I know I must really make a conscious effort from now on to remember that I already have everything I need. I must appreciate ‘the little things’, for they are in fact big.
Tomm Moore, Oscar Winning Director
The last little thing that made my day was at ComicCon in San Diego. It’s an amazing and bewildering event with 150,000 attendees every day for four days, usually dressed in everything from the standard comic nerd gear of teeshirts and shorts to full blown costumes of favourite characters. I was there to promote our new feature film Song of the Sea which is opening in the US in December and also to sign our new book about the design work that went into our first feature film, The Secret of Kells.
It was a pleasure to see a long queue each day waiting to get a drawing from me and the producer Paul Young. But the highlight for me, the little moment that made me smile was that in the queue was a young woman dressed as the character Aisling from The Secret of Kells.
It was so nice to think that our work had inspired someone to dress as one of our characters at such a huge event usually dominated by massive multimillion dollar franchises and properties. That really was a nice little smile for the day.
Lily Walton, Mother of the Creators of Voya, Aged 93
My motto in life is, “You have to keep going to keep going” and so there are lots of little things that make me happy. I had an operation on my knee and although my false knee works fine now, when i get my flight to Ireland, I book the wheelchair. I don’t really need it, but it gets me there faster!
I love to keep my garden and my son Michael visits to help with the big trees. I have a young outlook. I go to the over 60’s club and do a lot of charity work with them. We were even on the TV twice for it. We would go around entertaining people in the old people’s homes. I like to have a seaweed bath every evening, for the health benefits and the relaxation and so my friends have taken to calling me Seaweed Lillian. And my little treat – a glass of Bailey’s.
Omied Hallam, Volunteer Coordinator & Croquet Coach
I’m fond of a game of croquet and now I do coaching with a lot of people. I spend a lot of time with them and I like to have a bit of a laugh with them so when I realised on of the women I coach bakes, I hinted at that I’ve been doing a lot of coaching with her now so, she might want to bake me something. I told one of the other men she was baking me a cake so he brought me in one the next day. Brilliant. So i texted the initial baker to let her know he’d brought me one already, at which she declared, “Alright! Bake off!”. There’s currently five people ready to get involved with a bake off all just to make me cakes. And compete of course, but that’s an important part of the coaching really isn’t it!
Doireann Barrett, Founder/ Owner of The Gluten Free Kitchen Company
The Little things end up being life’s big events, for me receiving an email from Sally McKenna of McKenna’s Guides recently asking me could she forward our details onto the event organisers of Electric Picnic to include my product to trade at the three day event has been the highlight of 2 and 1/2 years of hard work and huge dedication and lots of sacrifices including lost time away from my son to create one of Europe’s first and Ireland’s only dedicated gluten and wheat free restaurants. The excitement it’s created that my company will be trading in the ‘Theatre of Food’ amongst some of Ireland’s highly respected food critics, traders and Chefs has had me smiling for weeks and has also given me the strength to keep working hard at developing a much needed service for the many people who find it challenging to eat out safely. I believe when we work hard and are grateful for what we have, we are rewarded in life. And this was one of my little rewards.
Tony Lawless, Holistic Health Coach & Therapist
A couple of weeks ago a regular client of mine dropped in for a session, relating to a back issue that she is working on. During the session it came to light that she was also having sinus issues which were causing head-aches. When we finished working with her back I had a couple of spare minutes before my next client.
I made a remedy up and asked her to take it daily. On Saturday of that week I was surprised to see 8 fresh organic eggs, still in their straw, sitting in a box at my front door. Since then I have enjoyed a regularly supply of eggs and blueberries fresh from her allotment.
We all possess different talents and when they are made available with a good heart the power of the deed is magnified greatly and enjoyed by all parties involved.
