Kittens, Puppies and the Long Road to Gratitude

My therapist once told me that there are two types of people in the world:  those who spend most of their time thinking about what they have, and those who spend most of their time thinking about what they don't. I had been seeing this therapist for about two years and had a lot of respect for her ability to wade through all my bullshit to help me get to the root of most issues.  I especially appreciated her insight in calling out when I talked about things as either black or white.  So when she told me this, I took it deeply to heart, cause I knew what she was really saying to me in her delicate, therapish-y way was, "You, my dear, are a member of the latter group."  It was humbling to hear, but I knew she was totally right.  I'm a glass-half-empty gal, you might say.  Always have been.  Even as a young child, I always had to have something ahead of me to look forward to, always had to plan and set goals that were just a little bit ahead of me.  The now was always missing something.  The now was never good enough.   

So, needless to say, gratitude, has never come easy for me. In fact, quite honestly, I spent most of my life really irked by people who spewed their gratitude all over the place for everyone to see.  A similar kind of irked I felt for people who wore sweatshirts with puppies and kittens on them.  Like, what gives you the right to walk around with that much concentrated happy and cuteness emblazoned on your chest?  And why should I be forced to look at it?  So, daily gratitude meditations? What. Ever. Gratitude journals?  Hearty eye roll.  Gratitude, like faith, was for the naive, ignorant and baby animal apparel wearers of the world.  Because when it came down to it, how was it possible to focus on the joy in life without simultaneously ignoring the incredible amount of suffering in the world?  I chose to focus on the latter because that seemed more important and more urgent.  Black or white.  It was that simple.

But then here's the thing. Something shifted. It was a number of events over a number of years, but it all accumulated into one crazy wild shift.  And as it shifted, as I shifted, things started to drop away - things I had been clinging to that were not really serving me, things I was terrified of letting go of for fear of what may come in to replace them.  And as things started to drop away and the ground beneath me got less and less stable, I needed to trust something new.  I needed to connect with something that felt really really real among all the unreal and false truths that were quickly dropping away.  I needed a nightlight.  I needed to believe in the light, believe that light was possible, to have the strength and endurance to sit in the dark.  I needed to breathe in moments of good.  So, I warily gave it a shot.  And then I got it.  

We aren't grateful in spite of all the terrible things that could go wrong with ourselves and the world, we are grateful because of them. Practicing gratitude gives us energy.  It nurses our compassion. It feeds our empathy. It walks hand-in-hand with our ability to engage courageously with the world, especially with the discomfort. It doesn't necessitate that we ignore the suffering like I had initially thought, it just helps us not to get too weighted down by it. Gratitude catalyses our light.  Gratitude gives us joy. 

And here's the kicker, and here's what had been holding me back for so long from going there, and here's what had kept me in shame and resentment around gratitude for so long:  not only does gratitude give us joy, it requires us to acknowledge that we are worthy of that joy.  And in acknowledging that worthiness, gratitude, then, becomes a radical, revolutionary, contagious act of courage.

I see all that now. And gratitude's grown on me.  Kindof like those people in the animal sweatshirts.  It's not any easier or more comfortable to practice, but it definitely feels essential to keep trying.  Everyday.  Multiple times a day.

So today and everyday, count those blessings.  Say them out loud.  See them in front of you, write them down, offer them up as a prayer, really breathe them in.  Flaunt your damn baby animals.  Spread your joy.  You're worth it.