Yes. For all thing from the small stuff — warm socks my dear kid gave me — to the bigger stuff — safety when things are teetering on unsafe in so many ways, I am thankful. And yep; that first cup of coffee in the early morning light before anyone else is awake is definitely among those things for which I am grateful. Thankful for this community as well. Blessings, Peeps! ❤️
I have a friend who always tells me that "a grateful addict will never use". That has become a reality in my life for the last fifteen years. Most days I find myself in gratitude and awe for an amazing Abba. On the days I'm struggling, which have been many since my son dies in May, I take time to write down a list. Some days, the best I can come up with is I woke up on the right side of the roots and I'm still functioning. Grief can be a bitch. I'm a local urban farmer and we get fresh (not dollar store crap) produce to neighborhoods that lack access (food apartheid). It's hard to be ungrateful when God keeps reminding you how loved I am and His Mission through the farm. It's the longest hard freeze we've ever had in Texas (the wind makes it feel like it's -14 outside) but my winter crops have made it thus far. The cold has enabled me to catch up on inside chores, the coffee is hot, and I'm nice and toasty here at the desk. Thank you for the gratitude reminder. God is sweet indeed even when He feels so far away at times.
Here in New England--where we're used to snow and cold--thinking of you in Texas, and hoping your crops survive and that you can stay warm and safe. Blessings on you for feeding people!
Thank you. We're praying but it's looking less and less that our winter crops will survive. This has been brutal on everyone here. Our power was out for about 16 hours. I managed to pick up our generator at the farm but I'm so sad for those who didn't have that option. Please keep folks here in your prayers. I love New England and hope to see it again soon! Take care.
I am overwhelmed with grief due to deaths in family and serious health diagnosis of a child i helped raise. And in that grief, i am grateful for the corners where people with all beliefs and doubts can come and be human.
And i am grateful for my second cup of coffee.
Tomorrow I will be grateful for living in a country not at war, for indoor plumbing, for friends keeping me human with phone calls, for snow.
Today I am grateful i can be sad and cry and grieve.
I first want to give my condolences. I am a hugger so please feel free to acknowledge the virtual hug for what it is. I can only imagine your brokenheartedness at a time like we are living in. I hope and pray God gives you peace and joy within your grief.
Sorry, Last one then I will be quiet for a while,, but the part about "giving AND recieving love" strikes close to home you can't just GIVE love without allowing yourself to also recieve love, your heart will get sucked empty really fast.
Today was the gospel reading on the healing of the leper. I am grateful for the times I have been outside looking in and I pray it gives me more compassion for those on the margins and the courage to welcome them in.
Grateful for sleep. If I do enough of it, eventually I have a dream that feels profoundly spiritual. As author Jim Butcher writes in Death Masks, “Sleep is God. Go worship.”
Grateful also for change, for how the Universe/God/Nameless transforms death into life and tragedy into rebirth. I’m not sure I authentically feel grateful for the losses I’ve experienced, but there is the understanding on some intellectual level that I am, that I would be profoundly spiritually lacking if not for them, so that will have to do. One of my favorite songs by the band Cloud Cult, No Hell, in part, is about this:
As kids we believed
that the angels talked
Everything is magic,
til you think it's not
It's easy to be thankful
for the things you've got
It takes guts to give thanks
for the things you've lost
We grew up believing
good wins over bad
So you gave away your heart
but the wolves attacked
But then a bigger heart grew back
The song is here, if anyone cares...I’m hooked on their stuff:
By the way, NBW gave us "Accidental Saints: Finding God in All The Wrong People" that is helping me authentically feel grateful for undesirable experiences in life as well.
Craig Minowa’s 2 year old son died unexpectedly in his sleep several years ago and he went on a pretty intense songwriting spree afterwards, writing in a ton of music about his questions and search for God afterwards. The music isn’t denominational or conclusory about the spiritual at all, but really seems to worship the search itself. The Seeker and Light Chasers are my favorite albums of theirs, but there are real gems in each album.
I am grateful for almost 10 years of sobriety and a spirituality that has resulted from that daily journey towards my truth that has given me freedom, peace and love. I keep pursuing that new truth one day at a time.
I am grateful for this community where being a feminist, humanist and a Christian doesn't conflict. I am grateful for a body that functions fairly well even if it's aging--minor breakdowns are acceptable. I am grateful for my eyesight. I love to read. I love to enjoy nature even if it has rained so long that I am beginning to think Noah might have been on to something with that Ark of his. I am grateful that even though I have lost my father, my mother is alive and well. I am thankful for my family (my two beautiful twin daughters and my bipolar husband); not everyone is as blessed in that capacity as I am and I know it. I am grateful for a good job even if I do have to teach in-person during a pandemic. I am grateful for all the wonderful people I have come to know and for those who have made me grow as a person. These are the thoughts I have to dwell on because the negatives which you can see sprinkled interspersed between my positives here keep making me want to demand more. How often I forget that God gives what he gives and we should be grateful anyway.
Gratitude that I am old, that my years have allowed me to receive the second dose of the Covid vaccine, that my state and county pulled it together, and yet the need is so great. I pray I not be selfishly grateful and do what I can.
Grateful for your post! That I cannot find a COVID Vaccine in my county in WA, Your success gives me hope to spend another day searching online for it... WA has not spread the vax equitably, but my beautiful dog brings peace.
What I realized was if a person didn’t know how to access online or have availability, disparity of access is so great. I am searching for ways I can get info to folks not online. I feel so lucky and wish you success in finding the vaccine. I am in NC
Out here there is a Facebook page by volunteers helping people find vaccines in WA state. .. at least I can isolate and stay home safely as our numbers rise!
Today I am grateful for a long afternoon nap when it was all starting to feel like too much. I am grateful for the reset a nap can sometimes bring... & that today, it did.
I'm grateful that my job meant I qualified for the vaccine (even if the second dose put me in bed for nearly three days!), grateful for working electricity, grateful for my girlfriend--who was very tolerant of how whiny I am when I'm sick. I'm grateful I'm feeling a lot better today, and can get some laundry and grocery shopping and cooking done before I go back to work tomorrow.
I'm also grateful I'm walking distance to both work and two grocery stores, because the ground is still covered in snow and ice in a city that rarely gets it and isn't prepared.
Half inch ice & 6 hours without power going into freezing night make me renewedly grateful for "current" haha 18 hours since with power, coffee, some VDay chocolate as the beautiful glaze now melts and slides while the temperature and my prayers ascend.
Thank you, Nadia! I am trying to wean myself of all petitionary prayer. Jacob Glass helped me see that I have ALWAYS been given far more than I need by a Creator who knows how little the things I think I need will serve my greater good. I believe that you are right, and that gratitude is the best daily route to an appreciation/celebration of grace! I read that Buddhist children are taught a blessing prayer called "Maitri." The prayer begins with self: "May I be free of suffering and the root of suffering." ("Suffering" is wanting things to be different than they are.) Then the child prays for parents, relatives, neighbors, folks they don't particularly like, and finally for "all sentient beings." When I want things to be different, it feels like I'm saying: "God, I know you're busy, but you've obviously overlooked these important things on my to-get list." Saying "thank you, God" feels more like a joyful acknowledgement that Jesus was right when He said: "It is finished."
Everyday I write in my gratitude journal. Sometimes it is the simple things you awaken to that are the things to be grateful for. I am so grateful for the husband sleeping next to me, keeping the bed warm. I am so grateful for that first cup of coffee in the morning. And, as you, I am so grateful and happy to provide a lap to my little dog.
Yes. For all thing from the small stuff — warm socks my dear kid gave me — to the bigger stuff — safety when things are teetering on unsafe in so many ways, I am thankful. And yep; that first cup of coffee in the early morning light before anyone else is awake is definitely among those things for which I am grateful. Thankful for this community as well. Blessings, Peeps! ❤️
I'm grateful for the technology that keeps me connected with friends and family across distance and forced isolation.
I have a friend who always tells me that "a grateful addict will never use". That has become a reality in my life for the last fifteen years. Most days I find myself in gratitude and awe for an amazing Abba. On the days I'm struggling, which have been many since my son dies in May, I take time to write down a list. Some days, the best I can come up with is I woke up on the right side of the roots and I'm still functioning. Grief can be a bitch. I'm a local urban farmer and we get fresh (not dollar store crap) produce to neighborhoods that lack access (food apartheid). It's hard to be ungrateful when God keeps reminding you how loved I am and His Mission through the farm. It's the longest hard freeze we've ever had in Texas (the wind makes it feel like it's -14 outside) but my winter crops have made it thus far. The cold has enabled me to catch up on inside chores, the coffee is hot, and I'm nice and toasty here at the desk. Thank you for the gratitude reminder. God is sweet indeed even when He feels so far away at times.
Here in New England--where we're used to snow and cold--thinking of you in Texas, and hoping your crops survive and that you can stay warm and safe. Blessings on you for feeding people!
Thank you. We're praying but it's looking less and less that our winter crops will survive. This has been brutal on everyone here. Our power was out for about 16 hours. I managed to pick up our generator at the farm but I'm so sad for those who didn't have that option. Please keep folks here in your prayers. I love New England and hope to see it again soon! Take care.
I am overwhelmed with grief due to deaths in family and serious health diagnosis of a child i helped raise. And in that grief, i am grateful for the corners where people with all beliefs and doubts can come and be human.
And i am grateful for my second cup of coffee.
Tomorrow I will be grateful for living in a country not at war, for indoor plumbing, for friends keeping me human with phone calls, for snow.
Today I am grateful i can be sad and cry and grieve.
I first want to give my condolences. I am a hugger so please feel free to acknowledge the virtual hug for what it is. I can only imagine your brokenheartedness at a time like we are living in. I hope and pray God gives you peace and joy within your grief.
Thanks for the virtual hug and prayer.
Sorry, Last one then I will be quiet for a while,, but the part about "giving AND recieving love" strikes close to home you can't just GIVE love without allowing yourself to also recieve love, your heart will get sucked empty really fast.
Today was the gospel reading on the healing of the leper. I am grateful for the times I have been outside looking in and I pray it gives me more compassion for those on the margins and the courage to welcome them in.
Grateful for sleep. If I do enough of it, eventually I have a dream that feels profoundly spiritual. As author Jim Butcher writes in Death Masks, “Sleep is God. Go worship.”
Grateful also for change, for how the Universe/God/Nameless transforms death into life and tragedy into rebirth. I’m not sure I authentically feel grateful for the losses I’ve experienced, but there is the understanding on some intellectual level that I am, that I would be profoundly spiritually lacking if not for them, so that will have to do. One of my favorite songs by the band Cloud Cult, No Hell, in part, is about this:
As kids we believed
that the angels talked
Everything is magic,
til you think it's not
It's easy to be thankful
for the things you've got
It takes guts to give thanks
for the things you've lost
We grew up believing
good wins over bad
So you gave away your heart
but the wolves attacked
But then a bigger heart grew back
The song is here, if anyone cares...I’m hooked on their stuff:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=uVUjFDbY1_8
Grateful for The Corners, for music, for everyone and everything that stirs the Spirit within us these days. 🙏🏻❤️
By the way, NBW gave us "Accidental Saints: Finding God in All The Wrong People" that is helping me authentically feel grateful for undesirable experiences in life as well.
I saw your soul without the skin attached....
.thats why The Corners is so very kool. Thanks for the link
I love that line...beautiful
Craig Minowa’s 2 year old son died unexpectedly in his sleep several years ago and he went on a pretty intense songwriting spree afterwards, writing in a ton of music about his questions and search for God afterwards. The music isn’t denominational or conclusory about the spiritual at all, but really seems to worship the search itself. The Seeker and Light Chasers are my favorite albums of theirs, but there are real gems in each album.
I am grateful for almost 10 years of sobriety and a spirituality that has resulted from that daily journey towards my truth that has given me freedom, peace and love. I keep pursuing that new truth one day at a time.
I am grateful for this community where being a feminist, humanist and a Christian doesn't conflict. I am grateful for a body that functions fairly well even if it's aging--minor breakdowns are acceptable. I am grateful for my eyesight. I love to read. I love to enjoy nature even if it has rained so long that I am beginning to think Noah might have been on to something with that Ark of his. I am grateful that even though I have lost my father, my mother is alive and well. I am thankful for my family (my two beautiful twin daughters and my bipolar husband); not everyone is as blessed in that capacity as I am and I know it. I am grateful for a good job even if I do have to teach in-person during a pandemic. I am grateful for all the wonderful people I have come to know and for those who have made me grow as a person. These are the thoughts I have to dwell on because the negatives which you can see sprinkled interspersed between my positives here keep making me want to demand more. How often I forget that God gives what he gives and we should be grateful anyway.
Gratitude that I am old, that my years have allowed me to receive the second dose of the Covid vaccine, that my state and county pulled it together, and yet the need is so great. I pray I not be selfishly grateful and do what I can.
YES!@! Finally!!!!! Been waiting for OLD AND WAY TOO FAT to pay off, got my first shot yesterday. YAHOO
Grateful for your post! That I cannot find a COVID Vaccine in my county in WA, Your success gives me hope to spend another day searching online for it... WA has not spread the vax equitably, but my beautiful dog brings peace.
What I realized was if a person didn’t know how to access online or have availability, disparity of access is so great. I am searching for ways I can get info to folks not online. I feel so lucky and wish you success in finding the vaccine. I am in NC
Out here there is a Facebook page by volunteers helping people find vaccines in WA state. .. at least I can isolate and stay home safely as our numbers rise!
Today I am grateful for a long afternoon nap when it was all starting to feel like too much. I am grateful for the reset a nap can sometimes bring... & that today, it did.
I'm grateful that my job meant I qualified for the vaccine (even if the second dose put me in bed for nearly three days!), grateful for working electricity, grateful for my girlfriend--who was very tolerant of how whiny I am when I'm sick. I'm grateful I'm feeling a lot better today, and can get some laundry and grocery shopping and cooking done before I go back to work tomorrow.
I'm also grateful I'm walking distance to both work and two grocery stores, because the ground is still covered in snow and ice in a city that rarely gets it and isn't prepared.
Half inch ice & 6 hours without power going into freezing night make me renewedly grateful for "current" haha 18 hours since with power, coffee, some VDay chocolate as the beautiful glaze now melts and slides while the temperature and my prayers ascend.
Thank you, Nadia! I am trying to wean myself of all petitionary prayer. Jacob Glass helped me see that I have ALWAYS been given far more than I need by a Creator who knows how little the things I think I need will serve my greater good. I believe that you are right, and that gratitude is the best daily route to an appreciation/celebration of grace! I read that Buddhist children are taught a blessing prayer called "Maitri." The prayer begins with self: "May I be free of suffering and the root of suffering." ("Suffering" is wanting things to be different than they are.) Then the child prays for parents, relatives, neighbors, folks they don't particularly like, and finally for "all sentient beings." When I want things to be different, it feels like I'm saying: "God, I know you're busy, but you've obviously overlooked these important things on my to-get list." Saying "thank you, God" feels more like a joyful acknowledgement that Jesus was right when He said: "It is finished."
Mobjack Bay Coffee Roasters DEADRISE BLEND. "Strong enuf to wake the dead". Woof.
Everyday I write in my gratitude journal. Sometimes it is the simple things you awaken to that are the things to be grateful for. I am so grateful for the husband sleeping next to me, keeping the bed warm. I am so grateful for that first cup of coffee in the morning. And, as you, I am so grateful and happy to provide a lap to my little dog.