Last night, I struggled to sleep. Moving from one side to another, I readjusted my pillows, turned up the fan, and with a smirk on my face, I counted sheep. Those hours in the middle of the night fill silence with more silence. A vortex of the past, present, and future forms a mind-map in your head. Sleep becomes futile. It is those restless fueled nights that lead to irritation the next morning.

I woke up complaining about my lack of sleep and how my whole day . My daughter’s questions this morning hit with annoyance. Dragging my feet out of bed, I walked to make breakfast for her, which only constituted pouring cereal in a bowl and drowning it with some milk. As she ate, I thought about the day and the cloud above my head kept pouring in a litany of grievances. It is so easy to slip in this mode of what is wrong, rather than focus on the goodness that can percolate if you alter your focus on what is right.

My Pandora radio station, on cue, started to play the song, “Little Wonders.” The chorus seem particularly apt for my morning: Our lives are made in these small hours, These little wonders, these twists and turns of fate, Time falls aways but these small hours, These small hours remain.”

It took a second, but the words small hours and little wonders kept whispering in my ears. My mind needed to take a snapshot of the collage of moments that resonated goodness and yes, wonder.

I started running a very different list in my head. My daughter gave me a million hugs before she went to school. My husband told me that on the way there they both sang, Katy Perry’s Roar in surround sound. I took a sip of my fresh, brewed coffee. I texted a good friend who is celebrating her birthday today. In the same breath, I received a few emails that were littered with invitations for dinner. The night before I shared a comforting conversation with my sister. That same evening I took time to make lasagna and homemade tomato soup that I saw my family enjoy. There were good writing moments and epiphanies that popped up during the last week.

As I write this, a quiet fills in my office. The good kind.  I notice yet another little wonder.