My earnest desire is to find joy in every single day, but I understand some days are harder than others. Recently, I came across a quote that made me chuckle: “By replacing your morning coffee, by green tea, you can lose 87% of what little joy you still have left in your life.” The more I thought about it, the more it made me laugh!

I am a chai lover. Part of my every day is a Chai-Ritual that I repeat regularly, starting from the moment I first open my eyes to the setting of the sun. My ritual includes a soul-brewed chai, made with tea leaves, perfected to a precise temperature, resulting in a moment when that warm mug of pure indulgence hits my lips and awakens my senses. All this results in an evening ritual of stacking a row of mugs in the dishwasher, until the cycle starts again at sunrise.

I choose my cafes, not by the food they serve, but by how well they make their chai. Tea-bag cafes won’t do, and neither will any sugary-powdered chai-cafes. It must be the proper spicy chai, served in a mug, that has become my symbol of comfort.

With this background in mind, I am sure you can picture my disappointment when my favourite café had changed their chai orders to be served in a glass. This tiny little glass sat on my table. I tried to wrap my fingers around it, to bring me the feeling of comfort I am used to, yet the glass in my hands felt slippery and awkward. By the time I had taken my first sip, my chai was cold.

My grandma taught me to always be polite, yet everything in me rebelled. I wanted to call out: “Wait a minute! This is not what I ordered!”

Do you ever feel like that about your life? Have you woken up one morning, thought about the way your life has turned out and said to yourself: “Wait a minute! This is not what I ordered!” I have. In the midst of one health problem after another, I sometimes sit here thinking that this sure isn’t the life I imagined for myself. Life can get us down. Life is beautiful but at times it can also be difficult. Simply put, sometimes life is only about survival.

It is those wearisome demanding days that have helped me to relate to the above quote. By replacing my mug of chai, I can lose 87% of what little joy I still have left in my life. All I can say is don’t let anyone take your mug of chai or coffee from you. It’s during the darkest of days that we need to search for those small little treasures harder than during the sunny ones.