Joy in the Brambles

Have you ever stumbled across joy in the most unexpected of places, like amidst the sharp edges of grief? This episode welcomes Ross Palfreyman, a seasoned attorney turned author, who shares his profound insights on finding "Joy in the Brambles." Together, we unravel the complexities of grief that arise from life's various challenges, including family squabbles, health scares, and career shifts. Ross offers a compelling approach to embracing joy even when faced with life's prickliest obstacles, as well as a look into our spiritual understanding of joy as a covenant with a higher power.

The concept of charity within the Christian faith takes center stage as we contemplate how acts of kindness and service to others can lead to a deeper experience of joy. I recount a heartwarming story of inclusion involving a young boy in our church and discuss the legal nuances of contracts to illustrate how committing to compassionate actions can be seen as a promise, a bilateral agreement, with the divine. We consider the idea that joy from service is a gift, not a penalty, filled with acts of love and care for others, however small they might seem.

Transcript

Kathy: 0:00

Hey everyone, welcome back again to As I Live and Grieve. Thanks so much for joining me again. We always have a great guest. Today is no different. I do want to remind you all, if you haven't already and you're on Facebook, to jump over please to the As I Live and Grieve page and just join our conversation.

Kathy: 0:23

Right now we're kind of talking about the myths of grief, that whole thing about grief, especially that the only form of grief is when you lose someone to death, and we all know that that's not true. So pop on over for some great conversation and, coming up after the myths of grief, we're going to talk about how it feels to be an orphaned adult, how, when you as an adult lose a parent or both parents, and how that feels in your life, it's kind of a devastating situation. Okay, so on with the show. With me today is Ross Palfreyman. Ross, thanks so much for joining me today. We're going to talk today about grief and joy, and sometimes those are two words that you don't expect to go together. So we're going to get some insight into that. But before we start that, Ross, would you just tell our listeners a little bit about your background, please.

Ross: 1:24

All right, my name is Ross Palfreyman. I grew up in Southern California and I've been married for - this is on air, so I better get this right - 47 years, I think. I think we're, yeah, I think we're approaching our 48th year. We have six children, we have 17 grandchildren and we have one great grandchild on the way for August 1st. I was an attorney for 45 years in Southern California, doing mostly litigation in the labor area, mostly defending large corporations, insurance companies, cities, school districts, cities, school districts, and I have done enough of the other side representing plaintiffs that I kind of have an understanding of both sides and have some feelings for both sides. I think they both make a point and getting to the middle somewhere is actually the best way to resolve issues.

Ross: 2:20

After 45 years as an attorney, I thought that it would be good to start the second half of my life, which I believe will be a bit shorter than the first half, and do something that's a little more positive and a little more helpful to people. And so I wrote a book called Joy in the Brambles, which we're here today to talk about a little bit, and the idea that joy can help us through lots of problems, that it is available to us all the time, really, that it is actually a gift for God or fulfillment of a contract between us and God. And the idea is that we go through all kinds of problems in life. Families split up over politics these days, which seems odd to me, but it happens, and I think there's real grief involved with that. At the very beginning you had mentioned that grief oftentimes is equated only with death, and that's not really true. We can get very grief- stricken by all kinds of things that happen to us -- health issues, job loss, there's just so many different things that happen to us and we can become very depressed. And the point of the book that I wrote is that when you have those kinds of problems that cause grief and deflect from joy and happiness in life, there is a formula by which you can escape some of that and have joy in your life despite the hardships that come our way and we all have them at one point or another, sometimes many times, but we can get through those.

Ross: 3:58

Name of the book is Joy and the Brambles. I had a different title for the book at one point, but the brambles are back east. You have blackberries and raspberries that grow and all the little branches and things that grow out there. They're prickly and you have to go through those to get to the fruit, and so the idea of joy and the brambles the title is that we do have things in life that we have to get through to get to joy, but we can do it and it's well worth it and it's very valuable to us in the end. So the idea is now in my life. I'm trying to spread this message that joy can be had in circumstances and sometimes we need to actually pursue joy specifically to escape grief and to escape hardships. But we can do it.

Kathy: 4:47

Absolutely, and I love this perspective on it and I love the entire concept that you can have both and you have to work to get it. A certain amount of it may be there waiting for you, but you still have to want it, you have to reach for it. You mentioned a formula. Tell me more about this formula.

Ross: 5:11

For joy. First of all, as an attorney, I went to law school First semester. We have the class and when I was listening to some of it there were two classes of contracts. There were two classes of contracts One is a bilateral contract and the other is a unilateral contract and initially I thought I don't care, I mean let's move on. But the reality is pretty important. So the first one, a bilateral contract, we enter into them.

Ross: 5:38

Oftentimes we buy a house. I make a promise that I will sell my house for half a million dollars and these days that's a shack on pretty much. But let's say a half a million dollars, I'm willing to sell my house and someone comes along and says I want to buy it for a half a million and you sign a contract and that's a promise. For a promise I just sell. You promise to pay me, it's enforceable and you can sue on that contract. If you, if I decide I don't want to sellable and you can sue on that contract. If you, if I decide I don't want to sell it, you can sue me and make me sell it. If you don't want to buy it, I can sue you and and try to make you pay for it right. So that's a promise, promise.

Ross: 6:15

I think this joy concept falls into a unilateral contract idea and that is that God, however you perceive him, whether you're a Buddhist or a Catholic or a Mormon or a Protestant or a Muslim or anything, however you perceive God, God has a contract with us and it's a unilateral contract. It's a promise for an act and in the New Testament, I happen to be a Christian fellow myself, so I read the New Testament and in the New Testament Jesus talked about losing your life in the service of others and the idea that look, if you want to find your life, lose it serving others. He also talked about peace, that he was going to leave with his disciples, and then he said but it's not your kind of peace, not the world's peace, it's my peace. And there are a few other areas in the New Testament that talks about this in general terms. But the idea of a promise for an act, I really believe that when he described the two great commandments, Jesus talked about loving God, and the next great commandment was loving your neighbors.

Ross: 7:28

And we seem to get caught up in all kinds of other commandments and do's and don'ts and things, but those seem to be the two big ones, and if we could all just agree on those two, I think we'd be in pretty good shape and realize that the rest of them, you know, do what you want to do with them, but those two are big ones and I think that's his promise to us that, look, you do those things, you love God and you love your neighbors, who he describes in a story about the Good Samaritan as being everyone. If you do that, then I will bless you with joy and I will give you the peace that the world can't give you but I can give you. And so it's an indwelling of this spirit. It's a more heartfelt, deep feeling of satisfaction that I think years later you can come back and still enjoy. That contract is interesting because and I like to analogize it to a unilateral contract because his promise of blessing you with joy is constant and it doesn't end. So if you make mistakes in life, if you're having periods of grief in your life, it doesn't matter. If you will act in the way he asked you to, by loving your neighbors, he will give you joy at any point in your life. So the idea of joy is it's a deal you have with God and he will bless you with it if you will be kind to his children. If you're not kind to his children, he doesn't punish you. You just don't get joy. You get locked up in all the brambles of life.

Ross: 9:02

Families is an example, I think, these days, unfortunately a good example. We have two I was going to say very old people running for president, but the reality is I'm almost their age, so I will say two people who are in the second half of their lives and the feelings for or against these two fellows has become so strong that it has broken up families. It's broken up friendships and really over something that we don't really have direct control over anyway. So how are we getting so wound up about this? We do it in terms of religion that our children are in. Are we going to chastise them for choosing a different religion or no religion, or are we only going to love them if they choose our religion?

Ross: 9:49

There are all these things that can come up in our lives that separate us from joy, because joy is something that we have to actually pursue. We have to be kind to people around us, and if we are, then it covers up all kinds of problems in our lives. It distances us from those problems. And I think this comes around to what you and I had spoken about before, about the grief process, and one of the great things that service does to grief is it helps to separate you from the actual grief that does exist. People say, oh, just get over it, it's horrible things, it's bad stuff, and you don't just walk away from it.

Ross: 10:32

But what you can do is you can see other people's problems, you can care about other people, which I say is the first step towards it is you actually care about other people. Once you're caring about them and I'll tell you a story in a second once actually care about other people, Once you're caring about them and I'll tell you a story in a second once you care about other people, then you have to take the next step, the second step, which means to actually think about well, how can I solve this problem for this person, how can I help them? Rather than just well, I see a problem and move on, you actually think about it. Well, what can I do to help? And then the third step is charity, which Paul describes as the ultimate in Christianity.

Ross: 11:09

You have to commit charity. I call it committing charity by actually following through with the compassionate thoughts that you had about what can I do to help. And once you do those things, then some of the lives, some of the horrible things that are in our lives, they just go away. They don't disappear, but your ability to deal with them improves because you have other things in life that are joyful and you realize that life's not all that bad if you can figure out how to deal with the problems by serving other people. So it's kind of an odd thing.

Kathy: 11:46

So does service, then, and some of my questions may seem very simplistic. I sometimes say these are toddler questions, because there may be questions that a little child might ask. So to be in service means you are caring about or doing something for others. Correct, correct. And that is one of the big steps that you can show and honor that commandment. Love thy neighbor. Oh, for sure. Okay, yeah, for sure. And you mentioned that God is not punitive.

Ross: 12:36

So that if you decide to not serve, love your neighbor, you're just not going to achieve joy, Right?

Ross: 12:40

I mean there are those that would feel that's punitive. It is. Yeah, I don't understand that really, because you almost have to take the position, then, that God is required to bless you whether you do the right things or not, and you don't have any responsibility or obligation to behave in any way. And I have a hard time believing that. I think that God wants you to behave in a certain way. He's not going to throw you under the bus if you decide not to do something, but at the same time, you're the one that chose not to go forward in a manner that would provide you with the blessings that he's promised you. So if I can tell you a story real quick.

Ross: 13:26

Here's a story about these three steps caring, compassion and charity and it's a story that doesn't paint me in the best of light, but it's actually a decent story. So I was in a leadership position in my church which made me sit on the stand on Sundays and I would look down at the congregation and there was a boy in the congregation. His name was Dominique and he was from the poorer part of our town and he was 12 years old, which meant that he could start to actually participate in passing the sacrament in our meetings. But he didn't. You know, I cared, I looked at him and I thought, well, what's going on? And after one meeting I went down and asked him you know, hey, you know you've now been blessed with this opportunity, but I noticed you're not doing it. What's wrong? And he said well, he was very poor. He wore a plaid shirt to church, same one every week, levi's and kind of beat up tennis shoes. And he said I don't feel right passing because everyone else's shirt and tie and so I don't feel good about that. I said, oh, okay, I cared enough to ask.

Ross: 14:43

So I went through the rest of the day and my different duties in the church and I went home that evening and I went to my wife and I told her about Dominique and she said, well, okay, this was many years ago. I don't remember the exact terms she used, but synonyms with you're the biggest dork I know. You can do, you know. And I said, well, what do you mean? And she said, well, take him out, buy him a white shirt and a tie. Yeah, just go out and do it.

Ross: 15:12

And I thought, okay, those three steps caring, compassion and charity I did number one, I care, but I wasn't compassionate enough to take the time to think what can I do to help him. And I got home and my wife she's kind of straightened me out and said just do it. So that next Wednesday night I picked him up and we went to the Glendale Galleria and I got him a white shirt and a tie. And it was so much fun to see how happy he was about that that we got the pants and the belt and the shoes.

Ross: 15:40

I mean, we got the whole thing and it was wonderful and, even though I didn't think of it myself, I was the beneficiary of God's blessing of joy to me, because when my wife helped me with compassion and charity, I was able to participate in this joyful act where God says look, you take care of my children, I will take care of you. And he does. But there are these three steps we have to follow to get there and we don't always do it. But in that case I did, with a little help Well, a lot of help.

Kathy: 16:16

Right, right.

Ross: 16:17

I was only one third the way through the process.

Kathy: 16:19

That is a great story and that was when you were talking about in my first thought a was to just go shopping.

Ross: 16:24

Absolutely.

Kathy: 16:25

Let's go shopping. That's an easy fix.

Ross: 16:28

Yeah, definitely my bad.

Kathy: 16:31

But that's okay. You know, sometimes you can be too close to an issue too that you may not see that easy resolution until you step back a little bit. Yeah, and that was one of the things I kind of wanted to mention too, that the caring, the compassion and the charity we sometimes might get stuck on one of those steps.

Ross: 16:54

Yeah, on one of those steps, yep.

Kathy: 16:56

So sometimes and I'm always talking about this, having an open mind that if you see a situation that kind of strikes you, that you care about the situation and you think, well, you know, okay, but that shouldn't be, that's not right, don't stop there, right, go to the next step. Well, what would fix it? And then what can I do to help fix it? So the other thing I wanted to mention is back when you were talking about the different types of contracts and the bilateral and the unilateral. My Latin comes back to me, me and I know that bilateral is two sides, which is perfectly understandable. With the sale of a house, even because you sign a mortgage, you agree to pay it and the bank agrees to give you enough money so that you can buy it and live there, okay, that's bilateral, two sides to it. Unilateral, as you describe it, is a little more difficult for me to understand initially. Now I understand it, but I want to make sure our listeners understand, okay let me give you an example of a unilateral contract two sides to God's contract.

Ross: 18:16

Yes, yes, there's actually. In the initial offer phase of a unilateral contract, someone makes a promise or a proposal. So, for example, I have a fence in the backyard that needs painting and so I say I will give you $500 to paint my fence. I then become obligated If you paint my fence, I have to pay you $500 to paint my fence. I then become obligated If you paint my fence, I have to pay you $500. But you are not obligated to paint the fence.

Ross: 18:45

If you decide you don't want to paint the fence, you can walk away and the offeror, the one who said I'll pay you, can't do anything about it because you never made a promise. You were going to do it. There was just this open-ended invitation to do it. Sometimes we get into trouble in the law when let's say I'll pay you $500 to paint your fence and you say yeah, and you go on vacation to New Zealand for a month and then you come back and you decide, yeah, I'll paint the fence, and you, just without talking to him, you go paint the fence and he had in the meantime decided well, I'll paint the fence. And you, just without talking to him, you go paint the fence and he had in the meantime decided well, I was just going to tear down the fence, so I don't need to paint. But you've now painted it and you want your $500. So that can become a problem in a unilateral contract as to the timing.

Ross: 19:31

But the reality to most of those unilateral contracts are that, look, I make you a promise, I'll do this for you if you do this for me. So you're not obligated to do anything if you don't want to. But if you do, then that becomes a binding contract and you can collect. So that, to me, is what God has done for us. He said look, anytime you perform an act of charity to one of my children, I will give you joy. Doesn't even have to be a big act, little act, it can be anything. If you are kind to my children, I will help you and bless you in your life. And the way Christ presented it in the New Testament was peace. He even compared the burdens that he had in life in one point, saying that my burdens are light and I'll take on your burdens. My burdens are light. That's a matter of interpretation. Being crucified is probably not a minor burden, but that was kind of the idea was that if you perform, I will pay you, and this offer is open all the time.

Kathy: 20:34

Right. So what keeps it unilateral, then, is that you don't have to promise to do it, you just have to do it.

Ross: 20:43

Just do it, and if you don't do it, there's no punishment. You walked away, but you don't have his blessings.

Kathy: 20:48

That would come from the performance, the fact that you don't get, that you don't receive joy. That's on you, yes, exactly.

Ross: 20:54

Exactly, that's on you. Yes, exactly, exactly. It's always there, it's always available.

Kathy: 20:58

Exactly.

Ross: 20:59

Exactly.

Kathy: 21:00

And we get, we run into those situations constantly, every day.

Ross: 21:04

There's a chance if you're paying attention where you can help someone.

Kathy: 21:09

Absolutely yeah, just go outside, look around you. It's incredible, especially in today's world, especially in today's world, especially in today's world, very often just greeting someone yes, taking a moment to talk recognizing that someone exists. It could be someone who is in the depths of despair, so isolated and alone, because maybe they have no family, no one that cares about them, and maybe you to say that color looks really nice on you, yeah, and they just beam because someone cares.

Ross: 21:48

And you walk away feeling better too.

Kathy: 21:51

Absolutely, because you receive their smile.

Ross: 21:55

So I live in a small town. I live in a small town in Cedar City, Utah. It's in the southwest corner, so kind of away from everything, and we have a grocery store here called Lynn's. And my daughter, whose ex-husband had just passed away and she was going through a tough time and life was very hard she brought her kids down here to Cedar City from where they had lived and she had just started a job and financially things everything was tough for her and she was grieving.

Ross: 22:26

She goes into Lynn's to shop and a friend of mine saw her. His name is Wayne Decker and he saw her shopping and he had just finished his shopping so he took his groceries out to the car and then he came back into the store and he just waited and when she finished shopping he went up to the cashier and paid for her groceries. And that was probably a year ago now, almost a year ago, and Kate, my daughter, still tears up over that. It was such a kind gesture and Wayne feels good about it. He goes. I felt like I could, I should help and so I did and he feels good about it and for Kate it's a memory that will last forever and the joy he felt from that doesn't go away, even if you have other bad things that happen. You can then think back on that and joy comes into your life. So anyway, that's an example.

Kathy: 23:23

I am convinced that every single person in the world today is grieving something. They may not even know that what they're feeling is grief related, truly. But when you think about it, even a toddler will grieve the loss of a favorite stuffed animal If it gets lost or somebody takes it home by accident, or it was left on the plane. You know, even toddlers can grieve. There are all, especially after the pandemic. There are all these instances of loss and that's really what grief is is the response to loss in our lives, and where, for a toddler, the loss of that stuffed animal is devastating. You know there's different degrees of it for each of us and every loss we experience we're going to respond differently. I've had four major losses of an infant son, my father, my mother and my husband in my life. This happened over decades. Every instance was different. My grief was different for each one. So if everybody's grieving and the act of caring is step one is so simple.

Ross: 24:56

Yeah, oh, very simple.

Kathy: 24:57

Why don't more people do it? What's stopping people?

Ross: 25:03

We're kind of selfish because we're worried about what makes us happy the most selfish or what our needs are. We have mortgage payments to make, we have children to get to school, we have the elderly an age I am approaching and I remind my children of it all the time that, hey, you're going to have all kinds of things that come up in our lives that detract us from other people's problems. I will tell you the end story. I have a lot of stories in my book, joy and the Brambles, that really help illustrate how this works. As an attorney, as a litigator, I would drive from town to town within the LA area. Some days I would appear in downtown Los Angeles in the morning and San Diego in the afternoon. I did a lot of driving and the freeways would pack up. It'd be difficult and you'd get irritated and out of sorts, and sometimes the freeways were so packed that I would just get off the freeway and take surface streets and on those days I'd call my wife and I'd say, listen, I'm off the freeway, I'm going to take surface, so I won't be home for a while, and that would mean I'd have to stop somewhere and get something to eat which made for eating habits. So this one day I was driving down Atlantic Boulevard, having gotten off the freeway, and I saw McDonald's on the left hand side of the road and I decided, okay, you know, it's gourmet meal for tonight. And I turned left into the parking lot and it was just jammed and I thought, oh, I was on the freeway, it was jammed, this is jammed. Cvs pharmacy was in the same strip mall and I thought, well, I'll just go get something to eat there. So I went over to the CVS and as I walked in the front door this was in the springtime, probably about now and there was this little and I was in a very poor part of town.

Ross: 26:56

This little boy, four or five years old, had in his hand Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, a DVD, and he wanted it and his mom was saying to him that they couldn't afford it. And he really was crazy how little kids I have six, so I know how they work and they would get something in their head and that's it. They would just stay there. So he was really bugging her about this DVD and, looking at them, I could kind of tell that no, she can't afford it.

Ross: 27:29

And then I went and got my Cheetos and a Milky Way and chocolate diamond do and you know all the, all the nutritious stuff for dinner. And I went to the counter and I put it all down and this young, very young mother and this little boy got in line right behind me and he was still talking about the DVD. I put the stuff down on the counter and I walked over and I picked up the DVD and I brought it over and I bought it with my stuff and then I turned around and handed it to him and then I realized, okay, under these circumstances, maybe they're taking this the wrong way.

Ross: 28:05

And so I didn't really look up at her, I just looked at him and I smiled and then I walked out with my stuff, I got into the car. Usually I start my drive and eat on the way, but this time I just sat in the car and I thought I made that kid's day. I made that kid's day and I felt really good and the two court appearances I had that day went away. I mean, they don't really go away, but in my mind all the tumult of it all just went away and the crummy drive on the freeway went away and the fact that I wasn't going to get home till late went away. And it's not that they completely disappeared, but they were crowded out of my heart and my mind by this act of kindness that I had done for this boy, not really thinking, well, what am I going to get out of it, because I'm never going to see them again.

Ross: 29:01

But it made my day and I felt this sense of joy, for a sense is what it was. And I think it would have been easy for me to just walk by that little boy and not even pay attention to what his problem was or what his mom's problem was in not being able to buy that for him and that is usually my day. I'm worried about my court appearances or travel or what I'm going to do with the kids or am I late to something, and so I don't think about things that would bring joy to my life. They would bring joy to my life if I just would think about them and then pursue them, but we often don't because we're so busy worried about other things.

Kathy: 29:46

If I'm understanding, and let me try to put this together if we're grieving and we're just really really feeling down and we can find an opportunity, maybe we're at the grocery store, and I know this happens to a lot of people. Grocery store trips after the loss of a spouse can be very, very difficult, especially if you shopped together and now all of a sudden you're shopping alone. Not only are you shopping alone, but you're shopping for food that you're going to eat alone, if you even have the motivation to cook it, okay. So grocery trips can be very, very depressing and sad on people who've lost partners. But if, at that grocery store, you see an opportunity perhaps to do something where it shows that you care about someone and you have the compassion to try to help them, and maybe you can even figure out the charity component and fix it, that, if even for a brief moment in time, alleviates some of the burden of grief that is weighing you down, you have been rewarded with joy.

Ross: 31:15

Am I correct? That's absolutely right. That's absolutely right. This young niece of mine I helped her with her wedding, so she was young. Now she's married, has some kids.

Ross: 31:27

I was in Lake Tahoe and we hadn't seen each other in quite a while and she was coming through Lake Tahoe with her husband and kids and she said, oh well, I'll stop by and say hi, which is great. Before she did that, she went into the local grocery store there and bought me a bag of little bite-sized Tootsie Rolls, brought those to me and gave them to me. And it struck me that who has a young family is busy trying to feed them and get them on this trip would remember even really who I was. I'm an old uncle, would remember even really who I was. I'm an old uncle. And she brought me those and just handing me those, and again, what was that? Four or five bucks. And she just remembered that I liked them. And just the fact that she remembered that I liked them, that she took her time to go pick up a bag of them for me my day, and she has since commented that it made her day that she could make me happy over something like that.

Ross: 32:35

I think those circumstances happen all the time In your example of shopping, and you're shopping instead of for two, now you're shopping for one, and do you really want to even turn on the stove? I think that's real. So if you're in the store and you have a neighbor or someone close by that you can say you know what, if I just drop these cookies off, or I just pick up one extra little thing and take it to them, or if you remember what is it they like, if they like a certain salad or something like that, you can just make it and take it to them and say I was thinking of you. And it is such a small act with such a great deal of positive benefit for both parties, for you who are preparing it. And now you're thinking about somebody else and not your own problems. It's not that those problems go away, it's just that you get a little better perspective of what they really are, and so you're helping someone else. And so I just find that this idea of joy and actually pursuing it if you know what it is and how you get there can change your life and impact it for the good.

Ross: 33:44

There's another story my wife says well, Ross, if you tell all the stories. Who needs to buy the books, know that they're all in there. Don't tell us that, yeah. So there's another facet to all of this that is, I think, fairly important. People say well, you know, can't I pursue being happy for myself? And I always say absolutely you can. You can pursue happiness and joy. Yeah, you can do both. The problem is, once in a while and I don't think very often, but once in a while you have to choose between the two, and because of that, I think it's important that you know what they are and how you get there, so that you can make a proper choice. And I don't even know that you always have to choose joy over happiness, but I would hope that most of the time you would.

Kathy: 34:32

I would hope that most of the time you would. Ross, I think you're spot on. I do hope that most of the time, people would indeed choose joy over happiness and on that note, sad to say, we have to wind down. We appreciate all of the listeners out there tuning in today and, as always, ross's contact information will be in our podcast notes and I hope you will reach out to him. I hope you will read his book and, at the very least, take care of yourselves, practice self-care and please consider for a moment actually choosing joy over happiness. See what it does for you. Thanks, tune in again next week as we all continue to live and grieve.