Gratitude

The word is often overused, but in my case underutilized.  Recently I’ve had flashes of it amidst a new year of displacement.

Our relatively recently-purchased home is stripped down to its “studs” and “joists”–words that I didn’t even know two months ago–because a second-floor pipe burst while we were out of town on Christmas Day.

Our community has rallied around us, and I’ve felt warm waves of gratitude pour over me, despite the many stresses of trying to rebuild, and balance with all of life’s other duties and opportunities.

I am also amazed that despite being unmoored, literally, I have everything that I need.  In fact, I’m less distracted by the ujja* that made up my room.  I have shirts, pants, a place to stay.  And insurance is paying.  It’s not overpaying, but we have enough.  At least for now.

I have a lovely space to meet with clients, private and full of light.
When I stop worrying–do you ever worry?(*wink)–I’m grateful for my slippers.  The wood floors.  The fridge.  Someone else’s art on the rental house walls.  

So much of our understanding of ourselves is based on a deficit, that we need more.  A better job.  More money.  A new house or car.  More land.  More fulfilling work.  Until…blank.

No, I didn’t mean to write ______ there.  We literally get to “blank.”  There is no arrival.  Retirement could be one destination, but then what?  What do we do with that time, especially when aches and pains and medical needs might abound?  There’s always more to do.

Photo by Jackson David on Unsplash

I’ve met people who enjoy this constant striving and it doesn’t get to them, but that’s rare.  More often, once ambition becomes a key factor, or “achievement” is the goal, there is no end to that cycle.  Rather than yearning and working for what we’re missing, what if we treasure what we’ve already found?

If you’ve read this far, something in you is open enough to that idea.  And I’ve written this far for the same reason.  I’m no expert on gratitude.  But rather than focusing on the need to show more gratitude, I can notice what I have, what I have done, and that I’m here in this moment of reflection.  And be grateful for that.

This, then, is a posture we can carry into work, into relationships, into the open air.  Just breathing in is an opportunity to give thanks.  It can seem cheesy until we actually do it.  

In my coaching certification program at New Ventures West, they gave us a laminated card that said “Gratitude or Resentment.  What do I choose today?”  So easy and yet so hard.  Go for it.

*(wondering what ujja is!  Feel free to reach out to me to find out!)