Practising Gratitude

Several years ago, my husband and I were visiting India on a vacation. Never having been there before, we were rather shocked at the disparate levels of wealth – we saw incredibly ornate and expensive weddings at the hotel we were staying at, while outside there were families sleeping on the sidewalk burning tyres to stay warm.

On one particular day, I woke up feeling miserable because I had come down with a bad cold. But complaining about my health stopped very soon after we left the hotel and I saw a leper begging for money. It made me aware that I had so so much to be grateful for!

More recently, at meal times, we’ve begun the habit of practising gratitude. It has been an especially important exercise for me in August which I have termed ‘Augustus Horribilis’. At the factory, we’ve had freezer malfunctions (first one, then the other), product loss, insurance screw-ups, a Revenue Canada audit, breakdown of our filling machine and then our forklift, and late payment from a US distributor. Yet, at the end of the day, I remind myself that we have each other, we have our health, we have a roof over our heads, and we have food on our plates. Yes, some months can be awful, but we have so much that we can still be so thankful for.

So, I thought I’d write about this on my blog, and provide some links for those of you who might feel that some greater power is conspiring against you to make your life miserable! Even on your worst days, I am sure that most, if not all of you have something to be thankful for.

Some links:

http://www.gratefulness.org/index.htm

http://www.ehow.com/how_2124912_practice-gratitude.html

http://www.breakoutofthebox.com/mindfulnessgratitude.htm