As I drove north into the city for a meeting, the driver beside me cut into my lane. I hit my brakes.

“I saw them coming. All harm avoided,” I think to myself.

The cell phone rings and the voice on the other line tells me they can’t make it and cancels our meeting.

I sigh in frustration, “They don’t realize I’m already here. Well, I’ll run some errands.”

I head south towards my husband’s office and pick him up for lunch. I order the fish and make a point to ask for tartar sauce. This place seems to forget the tartar sauce every time. We visit until the food arrives and, once again, the tartar sauce is not included.

I tell myself, “This is petty; not a big deal. Just get the server’s attention and ask for tartar sauce.”

I return home and check my emails and messages. My Facebook post has gotten a lot of “likes.” It’s also gotten quite a few comments that are causing a bit of debate on my page. My anxiety heightens.

I pray, “Lord, help this to stay civil. Help there to be healthy conversation.”

I walk to my kitchen sink and look out at the backyard. There’s my beautiful tree that we planted over fifteen years ago. It’s huge. The arborist said it grew much faster than normal. When I look at it, I feel peace as I stare at its branches, watching them sway in the breeze. Its limbs dance with grace; it’s beautiful. My thoughts wander to the memory of the conflict to keep it, as some don’t like big trees in our neighborhood and suggested we cut it down.

I shake myself from my thoughts, thinking to myself, “It’s here. It survived the debate. I’m still finding peaceful moments looking at this tree.”

All day, in every circumstance, there has been the potential to see the negative. But there has also been the same potential to see the positive. My spirit has tugged and warred on which perspective to take. Is the glass half empty or half full?

“A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit saps a person’s strength,” Proverbs 17:22, NLT.