Free to be Grateful

 “Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; remember that what you now have was once among the things you only hoped for.” ~  Epicurus

Easter is back again!

Already.

Last year at Easter, we had just been sent back into lock-down and all ‘non-essential’ travel and gatherings been put on hold or put off. This year though, the masks are off, that dreaded ‘corona’ has all but left our lips and the crisis of the moment is fuel shortage in Kenya! Indeed, when “this too passes” something else replaces it, fast.

One of my favorite functional medicine podcasts is in its third season and their theme for this season is ‘gratefulness’. I had mindlessly listened to a few of the episodes until it struck me that I was zoning out at the end where the guests were being asked the final 2 questions: do you have a gratitude practice and what two things are you grateful for in this moment. So I retraced my attention, rewound all the episodes and noted down what each of the guests had said.

Gratitude is such an integral part of a wellness practice that you cannot have one without the other. Also, there is always so much to be grateful for in any moment, no matter what is going on around you. My 2 things – I am living in a peaceful country, no matter the shortages; I am health, breathing freely and carrying on without pain. A person living in Ukraine or a patient admitted to a hospital cannot say the same things today, though they also have things they can be grateful for, especially if neither of them are corpses in a morgue on Good Friday!

In my Christian practice of prayer, it goes many ways – thanksgiving, petition for needs, intercession for others, worship of God. But sometimes my prayers can get flippant and repetitive like the one that’s said just before a meal. This Easter, I am practicing bringing mindfulness back into my gratitude practice, into my prayers and into how I live my life. If I am truly grateful for the ability to breathe freely again, do I stop and take deep breathes severally in a day? If I am truly grateful for the ability to congregate freely, do I gather with those I love and catch up on 2 years of lost time? I’m I really grateful for the peace I enjoy or am I just saying so while using my keyboard to fan the flames of discord every time I comment on a divergent political opinion? If I am grateful for my current health, do I guard my well being or am I working hard to invite dysfunction and dis-ease into my earthly vessel?

It is never too late to stop and say ‘thank you’. What are you grateful for today?

“Cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously. And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in your gratitude.” ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson


Comments

  1. BTOApril 16, 2022 at 2:15 PM

    A good reminder that gratitude has to go hand in hand with mindfulness...being present in the moment even as we declare our gratitude...otherwise we will invite back dysfunction and dis-ease. If I am truly grateful for ______, then I will______

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

On Pain

Image
  On Pain Kahlil Gibran, 1883 – 1931 And a woman spoke, saying, Tell us of Pain. And he said: Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding. Even as the stone of the fruit must break, that its heart may stand in the sun, so must you know pain. And could you keep your heart in wonder at the daily miracles of your life your pain would not seem less wondrous than your joy; And you would accept the seasons of your heart, even as you have always accepted the seasons that pass over your fields. And you would watch with serenity through the winters of your grief. Much of your pain is self-chosen. It is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self. Therefore, trust the physician, and drink his remedy in silence and tranquility:   For his hand, though heavy and hard, is guided by the tender hand of the Unseen,   And the cup he brings, though it burn your lips, has been fashioned of the clay whic...
Read more

Out for Service

Hi readers. Unfortunately the musings are at still at the garage and return date is still out in the clouds. I found a great quote that put this pause into perspective for me. As you hold out patiently, I'd love for you think about the things that look like unnecessary curve balls in your life today. Are they really?  Enjoy the archives, luckily they are rich in content as we wait for a return.  " The great thing, if one can, is to stop regarding all the unpleasant things as interruptions of one's 'own' or 'real' life. The truth is of course that what one calls the interruptions are precisely one's real life - the life God is sending one day by day. " ~ C.S. Lewis CG
Read more

Horse and Buggy Days

Image
  “ I am old enough to enjoy a bit of nostalgia, but wise enough to know that there haven’t been any “good ol’ days” since Eden (the garden, not the prime minister). ” ~ Ron Brackin During my devotion this week, I found myself reminiscing about the ‘good ol’ days’. One of the verses I’d read had put me in that frame of mind and I rested there a while before reality called me back. The verse was from Habakkuk 3:2, which reads “Lord, I have heard of your fame; I stand in awe of your deeds, Lord. Repeat them in our day, in our time make them known; in wrath remember mercy.” (NIV) I had been reading a news article before I read my Bible that day, and it’s easy to see why that verse jumped out at me and sent me into the land of Nostalgia. Things are bad and so much is not working out. Time is moving but not much else is. Problems are mounting and solutions are few. So yes, I remember the days when prayers were answered; when miracles were popping all around me; when it was one...
Read more