NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Witty, honest, and wise spiritual reflections that invite readers to embrace the bad, not just the good—from the four-time New York Times bestselling author of Everything Happens for a Reason (And Other Lies I’ve Loved) Kate Bowler believes that the cultural pressure to be cheerful and optimistic at all times has taken a toll on our faith. But what if we could find better language than forced positivity to express our hopes and our anxieties?  Have a Beautiful, Terrible Day! is packed with bite-size reflections and action-oriented steps to help you get through the day, be it good, bad, or totally mediocre. This is a devotional for the rest of us—which is to say, the people who don’t have magical lives that always work out for the best. As she composed these meditations during a season of chronic pain, Bowler understands how every day can be an obstacle course. She encourages us to develop our capacity to feel the breadth of our experiences. The better we are at identifying our highs and lows, the more resilient we become. Like modern-day psalms, Bowler’s spiritual reflections look for the ways we can expand our capacity for courage, love, and honesty—while discovering divine moments with God. With bonus sections to use during the seasons of Advent and Lent, this is an easy book to read along with other people too.  If you want to build your daily habit of spiritual attentiveness, this book is here to say: May all your days be lovely. But for those that aren’t, have a beautiful, terrible day! Kate Bowler is the three-time New York Times bestselling author of Everything Happens for a Reason, No Cure for Being Human, Good Enough, The Lives We Actually Have, Blessed, and The Preacher’s Wife and hosts the popular podcast Everything Happens . A Duke University professor, she earned a master’s of religion from Yale Divinity School and a PhD at Duke University. 01 When Everything is Out of Control Give me a sign of your goodness. —Psalm 86:17a (NIV) There is something people say when you are in a lot of pain or trouble or life is out of control. They say: “All you can control is your reaction.” And, sure, that’s often good advice. We can try to reduce the scale of our problem solving to a small, manageable step. But I don’t want you to have to skip that first true thing you are allowed to say: “I have lost control. This is happening to me.” This blessing is for when you need to say, “God, this is out of control. People keep telling me that I have control over this, but I really don’t. I need help.” Read or pray this meditation aloud if you need some divine rescue plan and some acknowledgment of that reality. All you can change, they say, is you. You don’t control anyone but yourself. All you can do, they say, is take a breath and consider your reaction to what is happening. Return to yourself. You are what is happening. What is happening is a landslide, God. The world melted before my eyes. It is the feeling of my feet going first then my back, smack against the ground then the whooshing sound of the earth as it moves. It’s the speed. God, why didn’t anyone tell me about the speed at which it goes— my horizon, my choices, my control— before, blink, blink, someone with a calm voice is asking me about my reaction to a world now left behind. You are there, somewhere out there, though I can hardly feel it. Send an angel, send a fleet, send them now. reflection prompt A long time ago I started believing (mistakenly) that I wasn’t allowed to ask for help. Is there someone you can reach out to and tell them what you’re going through? 02 You’re Not Sleeping Much I will both lie down in peace, and sleep; For You alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety. —Psalm 4:8 (NKJV) When I was young I could never sleep peacefully. I would hover in that place between dreaming and awareness, caught in the webs of restless dreams. Some were absurd (where is the last piece of that puzzle?). Others were terrifying (I can’t get out! I can never get out!). I would pace the house—mostly still asleep—in my red pajamas, worrying, worrying, worrying. As an adult, I still have never really gotten the hang of sleep. I lie there thinking, rehearsing, planning, despairing. This verse from the Psalmist has become a precious one to me. It says to me: Lord, you care even about this waking and sleeping self, the one who no one knows but you. Nearby someone is snoring with the efficiency of an industrial meat grinder and it’s not polite to hate someone while their eyes are closed. Or sometimes the bed is empty, they are gone, gone, missing and missed and there’s no use being grateful, for their silence now takes up all the oxygen anyhow. God, no one knows me like this. Moving from my concrete days, my immovable schedule, to nights when I unravel in long loops like a knitted sweater. I am someone else entirely. Needy and hazy, lonely and yet desperate to be alone