Hurray!
“Gratitude
makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision
for tomorrow.”
Melody
Beattie
I'm grateful the midterm
elections are over—we will not have to watch nasty attack ads
interspersed with the evening news. Small mercies. In fact, gratitude
is a transformational “task”—because it does involve a little
bit of work. It requires that we give our worldview a quarter-turn,
so we can see things from a slightly different angle. I am thankful
that I live in a country where elections are required, and where
everyone must yield to the will of the majority—even when I don't
always agree with the majority. Paradoxically, I find comfort and
stability when new leaders are duly elected, even though they bring
change.
Gratitude is
transformational in many ways. According to Melody Beattie, who has
written and taught extensively on the subject, gratitude can:
“unlock
the fullness of life, and
turn
denial into acceptance,
chaos into
order,
confusion
into clarity,
a meal
into a feast,
a house
into a home,
and a
stranger into a friend.”
Today, whether your
favorite candidates won or not, let's gather in gratitude for a
system of government that sometimes works. I'm excited to see how the
infusion of so many women will change our way of doing business. Will
they bring a bit of “soft power” to the House? The one thing we
can always count on is change, so we may as well be thankful for it.
Miraculously, gratitude can also transform one's mood from grouchy to
good, and wouldn't that be a welcomed change!
In the Spirit,
Jane
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