Imagine you’re a kid, in the back seat of your parents’ car, heading out on a road trip.

At your feet is a bag packed with all your favorite things: activities, snacks, maybe a plush toy or a blanket.

What’s in there? (Take a good look, I’m in no hurry.)

In my bag, there are activity books, markers, and Crayola crayons. As we traverse the country, I will pass the hours finding hidden objects, doing number and letter puzzles, finding the right stickers to put in the outlined spaces .

When I get hungry, I will find potato chips in my bag, plus a bunch of sweets: strawberry Starbursts, Bit-o-Honeys, a Butterfinger bar. A few watermelon Jolly Ranchers.

Thinking of my bag of goodies and my nest in the back seat of the station wagon brings a smile to my face. I hope your road-trip-bag memory does that for you, too.

It’s so helpful to revisit childhood for clues to our happiness. If we go back far enough, we can see who we were and what we loved when we were more unfiltered versions of ourselves.

When, as an adult, I did a personal inventory of the things I love as part of my “SIMPLE” life plan, guess what went on the list? Puzzles of all kinds, the smell of Crayola crayons, and Butterfinger bars. I have some more grown-up things on my list now too, like jasmine pearl green tea and my Ugg slippers. But so many of my loves and passions have been with me since I was young.

If you haven’t done so in a while, remember what you loved as a child. Then do some of it. Find 15 cups hidden in an illustration. Eat that lime popsicle. Start the border of a jigsaw puzzle. Do a somersault in the grass.

It’ll feel lovely. It’ll light you up inside, and then you can shine that light on other people.

What’s inspiring me right now

Kate Bowler is an author, PhD in religious history, blogger, podcaster, and young mother living with Stage IV colon cancer. What I love and find inspiring about her is that she is positive without being Pollyanna-ish about it and deeply religious without being evangelical. She is raw and honest about the hard stuff we have to confront as humans, and wishes the rest of the world (society in general, social media) would stop trying to encourage us to pretend to be happy and pulled-together all the time.

I’ve just started reading her book, “Good Enough: 40ish Devotionals for a Life of Imperfection.” If you’d like to read this with me book-club-style, check it out at your local independent bookstore or at the world’s largest online shop, and let me know by replying to this email. I’ll set up a chat group or a zoom session for us.