Live a life of gratitude

This Thanksgiving has made me stop and rethink a lot of things.
Re-center if you will. Yesterday, and early this morning I wasn't very grateful. In fact, I was feeling as un-greatful and grumpy as a cactus patch. I guess it started out by me thinking of everybody who wasn't going to come to our house for Thanksgiving this year, via to my parents divorce, and things being awkward. That made me feel particularly blue. Poor me. Poor us. Poor everybody.

After that, it seemed like my day gradually grew worse. I got a headache, and I started feeling ungrateful for a hundred other things that weren't working the way I wanted them to. Then early this morning my grandma had another heart attack. Bam! Not good!! I love my grandma so much, and I haven't been visiting her as often as I would like. Thus I started inwardly beating myself up for all the things I wasn't. So I sat on the couch and cried.

After that, I kept on thinking to myself, "Hey, Steph, it is Thanksgiving. Duh! Why am I not giving thanks? I need to give thanks. Not only do I need to give thanks today, I need to live a life of thanks and gratitude everyday!"

Then the question of the day was, "How am I going to live of life of thanks?" As the day progressed, I started thinking about what gratitude really is, why it's so important, and what I need to do to live in Thanks.

I surmised that gratitude is much more than a word. It is a feeling so strong that when you genuinely feel gratitude, and abundance in your life, it shows in your countenance, in every aspect of your deeds, and it flows like water and gives freely to all those who surround you.
When you truly acknowledge the abundance God has blessed you with in your life, you no longer need to compare yourself to others, or feel as though you aren't or don't have enough, or that we will never measure up. Lack is a lie the devil cooked up! So don't partake. It's not very filling. And you'll always be hungry if you eat what he serves.

Once you start to look for God's hand in your life everything starts to change. His love for us is endless, our potential is eternal, his abundance is everlasting. With the Lord there will always be enough. His abundance will be reflected in our lives if we go to him in prayer, and remember to remember that he is and will always fill those empty spaces in our Thanksgiving feast. There will always, even in the most difficult circumstances, be something to be grateful for.

My challenge to you is to go about this next week (7 days) and try to acknowledge God's hand in your life---try to be thankful, even when things go wrong. See, for that short time, if anything in your life changes for the better. Try to acknowledge his hand in the little things, as well as the big things. Then before you go to bed each night, write ten things you are truly thankful for in your new (Thankful Notebook)

I'm taking the challenge, how about you?

This is my grateful list tonight

Tonight I'm grateful for the healing power of laughter.
For warm hugs!
For people who need me.
For the opportunity to sing and make music with my sisters.
For the long summers past I had with my grandma gardening with her, and talking about everything under the sun.
I'm grateful for time to reflect and recenter.
I'm grateful for happy secrets, and long talks in the night with my sisters.
I'm grateful for the seasons of the year, and what they teach of renewal and acceptance of change, growth and harmony.
I'm grateful for the snowdrifts, and the fun I have stepping into them.
I'm grateful for the fun it is to eat homemade huckleberry pie with my fingers.