Gratitude

I’m always a big fan of good quotes, and this one came up on my metaphysical flip calendar on Friday.

“You cannot live on earth and avoid lessons; but you can learn them easily and with joy rather than struggle.” – Sanaya Roman and Duane Packer.

I’m thinking that learning them easily and with joy IS a big lesson no? I’ve been observing and talking to others and thinking about my own experiences, and realizing how much of our stress and anxiety is attached to outcomes, i.e. our having a lot invested in our own expectations coming to pass. Sometimes our expectations are based on “reality” and are reasonable. But sometimes they’re really what we want to happen. Or not to happen. In the latter two cases, the result is the same; we are not living in the present world of possibilities or accepting what is and we become messy balls of anxiety.

So in accepting the not-knowing, it might seem like we’re spending our lives walking on a tightrope of uncertainty, and in a way, I suppose we are. But if we believe that there is a reason why things happen, whether we can see it or not, that there may be a bigger picture that we don’t know about, or a lesson we have yet to discern, then the tightrope has an infinite safety net. We’re really always OK. It’s our own attachment to outcomes that prevents us from walking that sparkling tightrope called life with confidence and perfect balance. And leaping with joy. Yes!

Accepting Now and being grateful for all we have in this moment, can bring us joy and help us learn our lessons without struggle. It can be a challenge. I’m right on the journey’s path with the rest of you, trying to grasp the lesson a little better, on a deeper level each time, and coming back to joy. Happy travels.

Here you see something I’ve wanted for quite some time … a handsomely carved Komodo dragon. I spotted him probably two years ago in one of my favorite stores, Two Buttons in Frenchtown. At the time, they had one that was probably 5′ long. I really wanted that one, but didn’t dare look at the price tag. Each time I’ve been in the store, I’ve been powerfully drawn to one of these Komodo dragons. They are hand-carved by an artist in Bali, (I believe), and each is unique. I would hold one, or several in turn, in my hands, feeling a connection I cannot explain.

On the occasion of my birthday this past summer, I was given a check. I was asked to please spend it on something that I really wanted, something special. My immediate thought was of the dragon. And yet I have dallied, contemplating all the things I really need and should do with that money. Do you ever find yourself doing this? You are invited to do something or buy something that is unequivocally a treat for yourself, but instead you spend it on something practical, or wrangle endlessly with yourself over it? Like I have. You know, we really need to be good to ourselves, kind to ourselves, to believe that we are deserving of all that is good.

So about a week ago, doing some Christmas shopping in Two Buttons with a friend, I picked up a Komodo dragon, as I had so many times before. He had a different attitude in his posture than I had previously seen. He seemed reflective. And as I held him, once again considering my still unspent birthday money, one of my very favorite Christmas songs played through the store, John Lennon’s So This Is Christmas. And I knew that that Komodo dragon was meant to be mine.

There are no coincidences.

And then this Saturday I met a longtime friend for breakfast. We hadn’t seen each other in a while, and she returned a book to me that I honestly had forgotten I’d lent her — Gratitude, A Way of Life by Louise Hay and other luminaries. It’s easy to forget sometimes how much we truly have to be grateful for, and I felt that this book returning to me after such a long time was also no coincidence. Perhaps I really needed to re-examine how much I have to be thankful for in my life. So I’ve decided to read one of the author’s essays on gratitude each day. We can never go wrong being thankful and making it a daily practice.

Most likely you have your own Komodo dragons appearing in your life. They are opportunities to be kind to yourself, to be thankful, to even find moments of peace. Take them.

Let there be peace on earth. And let it begin with me. – Jill Jackson Miller