It’s the weekend before Thanksgiving which lends itself to an easy (if not obvious) thought of the week…that of gratitude. Recently, I was invited via Facebook to join a group that has set the intention of writing and sharing five things that you are grateful for, every day for a month. I thought this to be a great practice, one that I can share with a larger community, but more importantly, a practice that reminds me of how incredibly abundant my life is.
If we find ourselves trapped within the looping negative dialogue where nearly every thought and sentence begins with something like:
“I’m frustrated with…
I don’t have enough…
I’ll never get…
I’m mad at…
I’m not worthy and…
This country is in a…”
Then maybe it’s time to undertake a serious gratitude overhaul!
One of the many striking things we noticed when traveling through India was that people generally seemed happy. Not only were they incredibly polite, but how they greeted us as well, as the day seemed to hold an authentic sense of thankfulness. So many of these people had much less in the material world than we here in the States, yet their industriousness seemed to hold an underlying sense of being thankful for the chance to make a difference in our experience.
When we sit each day and engage in an inner dialogue that conjures up all that we’re thankful for, it’s as though a switch is flipped. We shift our perspective away from what appears to be lacking to what is present in our lives. A practice of gratitude lets us remember all that we are, all that we have and all that we can do. It’s more than enough when you get right down to it.
So, for this Thanksgiving and the next few weeks, I will stay committed to my daily gratitude practice. Feel free to join me…you’ll be thankful you did!
