I don’t know about you but I’ve been hearing a lot of people talking about what they learned from 2020. And what they are walking into 2021 with. I know I don’t have to tell you 2020 has kicked us all to the curb. For so many reasons we have all cried, laughed, shook our heads and prayed.

That got me thinking about gratitude and how important it is to practice. Especially those of us who struggle with finding gratitude after we have suffered such great loss. I do know as the years go on, gratitude becomes more obvious to me than it did in the earlier days. In the early days, if you’d asked me to find gratitude, I might have seriously clocked someone. but now, 14 years later after the loss of my daughter and 30+ years after the loss of my mom – those are just the two I’ll mention here – I’m dedicated to growing my gratitude. Here’s why….

Gratitude opens the door for happiness, joy, growth, health… you get where I’m going right? When you sit down and write what you are grateful for, even the simplest of things like food, shelter, job, you begin to see out farther ahead as to what you could be grateful for. The possibilities are endless. You have to just sit down with pen and paper with a focus on the goodness that is in your life.

I recently read “live for today but hold your hands open to tomorrow.” by Barbara Johnson. That struck me as something that we don’t practice more of. We tend to think about the past, or the future, but not today. What we stand in today, is our truth. We stand in our gratitude. We stand in what was and what is. By doing so we can stand with open hands for tomorrow.

Real gratitude starts now with open hands and be ready to say “thank you”.

Until next time,

M