Monday, November 26, 2012

Grateful For The Hateful

Gratitude.  It's a powerful force.

I found myself in front of the washing machine again last night, marvelling that all I have to do is put dirty clothes into a machine, press a button and VOILA! clean clothes.

Then I turned around and looked at the five piles of laundry that still needed to be done.

One part of me was very grateful for the ability to wash clothing so easily, that I had access to hydro and clean running water to make it all happen.  Another part of me was frustrated that I still had five piles left to do (knowing full well that it would easily be six piles come morning - how does laundry multiply so fast?).

This morning I woke up and ran through my daily 'things to be grateful for' list, then made my way upstairs for the dreaded 'wake Benjamin up for school' task.

Again one part of me could see all the things to be grateful for (a good nights sleep, a warm bed, my health, etc.) but when it came to waking up my son that gratitude went right out the window.

Do you see a pattern here?

Does this pattern seem familiar to you?

I didn't realize this was happening.  In fact, I thought I was doing a pretty good job in the gratitude department.  Making my neat little lists, taking time during my walks to look around and find things to be grateful for.  Focusing on gratitude before I fell asleep at night.  These moments of gratitude were filling me with a sense of peace and purpose.  Being grateful works!

But what about when the shit hits the fan?  Where is my gratefulness then?  That's where my challenge lies.

Gratitude moves you forward, my experience has been that any amount of feeling grateful is a very good thing for making positive change in your life.

I wonder though what kind of powerful force gratitude would be if I applied it to all those other times in life when things aren't running so smooth.  You know like your car breaking down (aka paying that hefty mechanic bill), physical pain or an unruly child.  These are the moments when gratitude is needed the most and when we don't acknowledge that, it slows the forward motion down, sometimes causing it to come to a screeching halt!

Gratitude 'should' be something we automatically feel, no matter what is happening around us.  I think though that we've become so busy with doing things and buying things and keeping up with things that it's not as natural as it was; once upon a time. 

So I would categorize being grateful as something you have to do on purpose.  It's something you have to be thinking about on purpose until it becomes a natural part of your personality (PS, it really is part of your personality but it's been hiding, practicing gratitude brings it back out into the open again).  Especially when you are being grateful for the hateful things in life, and there are sometimes a long list of hateful things. 

So....I am grateful that there are ONLY five loads of laundry left to do :)  And I am grateful that my son is healthy and strong enough to fight me off when I am trying to pull him out of bed :)

There, that's better.

1 comment:

  1. Haha that's awesome! Thanks to your words of wisdom I am doing the same :)

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