Dear Aunt Di: I am not grateful for this post. I am EUPHORIC over it. You nailed so much, articulated some unwieldy shit, all while being hilarious. At the risk of sounding spiritual, it arrived in the inbox with oddly perfect timing. In addition to lots of fortifying takeaways, I leave this realm glad to know you're getting quality time with your adorable niece, and enjoying your other bits of good news. Thanks.
Love this essay/post. I'm grateful to know others are also wracked with terror, dread, fear of dying because it makes me feel like I'm not alone. I only see ghosts when I'm sleep deprived or on the right chemical.
Great meditation on thankfulness on the eve of Thanksgiving, esp. where you say that what you are grateful for translates to, What are you about to lose? I share a negative reaction to gratitude journals as an emotional cure-all, but like how author Lynne Twist says, "We are not grateful because we are happy. We are happy because we are grateful." She calls it acknowledging the great-fullness of being alive. Love all the random photos too! Happy Thanksgiving!
As someone who has always struggled with counting the things I’m grateful for, you’re so right, so much of the “grateful industry” is sooo churchy! So much of the premise - the giving of thanks, the counting of blessings, the idea of having enough - is very religious! Thank you for making me feel normal in rejecting so much of that culture
Such cute pictures! Gratitude. I've been suspicious of it, and for most of my early life, downright determined not to be grateful. I was told, by more than one person in my family, that I should be grateful that my stepfather married my mother and "took us on"--the five of us kids that she already had. I resented that, and I think it gave me a chip on my shoulder about being grateful for anything for a very long time! I'm happy to say I am very grateful for a great many things in my life today. I'm not sure when I began to experience gratitude, but it has more to do now with appreciating things. Things like trees, snow, sailing, campfires, hot baths, my dog, but also when my husband does things for me like make me a special bookcase. He's easy to be grateful for.
You cann't decide one day you're grateful. Gratitude comes to you.
One morning I was on my way to work, sitting in a traffic jam. I looked around and saw beautiful wild flowers blooming next to the highway. I was suddenly filled with gratitude! If I hadn't been sitting in a traffic jam, I wouldn't have noticed the gorgeous flowers next to the highway! My mind filled up with similar thoughts: Thank God for my wonderful wife! I'm blessed to have a job to go to every morning, etc.
Ever since then, instead of getting angry or impatient went I need to wait, I count my blessings. But I never decided to be thankful, the ideas come to me.
I admire you for having the courage to write that expressions of gratitude do not come easily to you, because of where you are from, even though we now seem to live in a world of gratitude gropers. After reading your piece, I rethought my idea for a Thanksgiving blog, and wound up with "Grate Expectations," which examined how we would up using "gratitude" and "grateful" but not the root verb, 'Grate" from Latin, because the Anglo-Saxon verb "to thank" dominates our language. We can be "ingrates" but not 'grates." Thanks for challenging me to think about this.
Oh, thank you, dear Monica!
I am grateful for you. ; )
Oh, gosh, same, same. xx
Dear Aunt Di: I am not grateful for this post. I am EUPHORIC over it. You nailed so much, articulated some unwieldy shit, all while being hilarious. At the risk of sounding spiritual, it arrived in the inbox with oddly perfect timing. In addition to lots of fortifying takeaways, I leave this realm glad to know you're getting quality time with your adorable niece, and enjoying your other bits of good news. Thanks.
Robert! I love hearing from you, and thank you for this. xxxx
My pleasure. Good to have your voice in my head today.
Love this essay/post. I'm grateful to know others are also wracked with terror, dread, fear of dying because it makes me feel like I'm not alone. I only see ghosts when I'm sleep deprived or on the right chemical.
You're definitely not the only one!
Loved this.
Thank you for telling me!
Great meditation on thankfulness on the eve of Thanksgiving, esp. where you say that what you are grateful for translates to, What are you about to lose? I share a negative reaction to gratitude journals as an emotional cure-all, but like how author Lynne Twist says, "We are not grateful because we are happy. We are happy because we are grateful." She calls it acknowledging the great-fullness of being alive. Love all the random photos too! Happy Thanksgiving!
Thank you, Mary Beth! I hope you had a nice Thanksgiving!
As someone who has always struggled with counting the things I’m grateful for, you’re so right, so much of the “grateful industry” is sooo churchy! So much of the premise - the giving of thanks, the counting of blessings, the idea of having enough - is very religious! Thank you for making me feel normal in rejecting so much of that culture
Rejecting that culture is very normal over here! 👋🏼
Your photos!!!! Love!
I am so grateful for you.
Captured so many great sentiments here - thanks for writing!
❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
What a great post. I love reading your writing.
I love hearing from you, Carlos!
Such cute pictures! Gratitude. I've been suspicious of it, and for most of my early life, downright determined not to be grateful. I was told, by more than one person in my family, that I should be grateful that my stepfather married my mother and "took us on"--the five of us kids that she already had. I resented that, and I think it gave me a chip on my shoulder about being grateful for anything for a very long time! I'm happy to say I am very grateful for a great many things in my life today. I'm not sure when I began to experience gratitude, but it has more to do now with appreciating things. Things like trees, snow, sailing, campfires, hot baths, my dog, but also when my husband does things for me like make me a special bookcase. He's easy to be grateful for.
“‘He’s a toad,’ she clarified.” 💕👌🏽
That was definitely her takeaway.
That resonated a lot. Right now I am meeting my nieces live for the first time. I couldn't be more grateful for them.
Oh, enjoy them! My nieces are two of the best parts of my life. xx
You cann't decide one day you're grateful. Gratitude comes to you.
One morning I was on my way to work, sitting in a traffic jam. I looked around and saw beautiful wild flowers blooming next to the highway. I was suddenly filled with gratitude! If I hadn't been sitting in a traffic jam, I wouldn't have noticed the gorgeous flowers next to the highway! My mind filled up with similar thoughts: Thank God for my wonderful wife! I'm blessed to have a job to go to every morning, etc.
Ever since then, instead of getting angry or impatient went I need to wait, I count my blessings. But I never decided to be thankful, the ideas come to me.
That sounds like a spiritual awakening.
It seems to me that a person has to start out entitled to get anything out of a gratitude practice. If you already appreciate life, it doesn't help.
That’s incredibly interesting. I hadn’t thought of it that way!
I admire you for having the courage to write that expressions of gratitude do not come easily to you, because of where you are from, even though we now seem to live in a world of gratitude gropers. After reading your piece, I rethought my idea for a Thanksgiving blog, and wound up with "Grate Expectations," which examined how we would up using "gratitude" and "grateful" but not the root verb, 'Grate" from Latin, because the Anglo-Saxon verb "to thank" dominates our language. We can be "ingrates" but not 'grates." Thanks for challenging me to think about this.