I really like online shopping. It’s quick, it’s efficient, and I can do it at 1am in my pajamas.
The thing is, I’ve noticed that I find myself easily rationalizing why I need something when a minute ago, I was totally fine without it. Suddenly, something seems necessary, retroactively making what I currently have inadequate. I guess that’s successful marketing.
In that consumer mindset, which is hard to escape today, gratitude can be an endangered species. It’s difficult to feel like I have enough if I’m constantly receiving messages that more is always better. And what ends up happening is that we feel like if we just had that next thing, we would feel okay.
Over the years I’ve come to see that the happiest people are not the people who have the most, they are the people who notice the most. Gratitude is more than a feeling, it’s a practice; an intention. Gratitude means looking at the present moment and saying, there is a good here and I am being proactive to see it.
And so in the spirit of Thanksgiving, let us choose gratitude as a perspective on life; not a feeling we wait for but a feeling we choose to nurture. Gratitude doesn’t cancel out the pain and anguish or say that it’s not okay to feel difficult feelings, but we can still have moments feeling blessed and joyful.