“Gratitude can transform common days into thanksgivings, turn routine jobs into joy, and change ordinary opportunities into blessings.” ~William Arthur Ward
In honour of Thanksgiving Day in Canada today, and the long weekend that accompanies it, I offer you some thoughts on the role and nature of gratitude, the basis of thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving need not be relegated to a day, or a season, but rather to each day and all seasons.
I suspect that in the University of Life, the highest degree offered may be a Ph.D in Perpetual Gratitude.
“Gratitude is the inward feeling of kindness received. Thankfulness is the natural impulse to express that feeling. Thanksgiving is the following of that impulse.” ~Henry Van Dyke
Call it age, but I find, increasingly, that I am grateful for smaller things every day, the minuscule moments. Sometimes, even for no particular reason whatsoever, which is an unexpected additional pleasure.
Maybe it’s just practice, or a survival mechanism, but choosing gratitude is sometimes, it seems, the only choice that can assuage life’s inherent pain.
Gratitude is like the oil in your car: you can’t drive for very long without it.
Choosing thankfulness in the smaller moments (because, make no mistake, it is a choice) provides the practice required to eventually be able to choose gratitude in the larger, potentially more difficult moments.
Eventually, you will wake up each morning with a grateful heart and go the sleep every night with a peaceful soul.
That’s a degree worth pursuing.
Happy Thanksgiving, every one, whether you’re in Canada or elsewhere.
And may you feel joy today, with or without a turkey dinner.
“I am grateful for what I am and have. My gratitude is perpetual.” ~Henry David Thoreau
