Gratitude

This thanksgiving more than ever, my heart is full of gratitude -- to those doctors and nurses, specialists and therapists who during the course of the last two months rescued me from the edge of the precipice. There, but for their devotion and care, I would no longer be here today. So thanks. And, of course, my family and friends who stood beside me through thick and thin- actually mostly thick- praying and lighting the way to my road to recovery. So thanks again.

When in life we are faced with challenges, gratitude opens us to a larger perspective that helps us more effectively address them. When we’re unhappy—depressed, angry, in pain—we contract. The simple practice of gratitude actually begins to relax the mind. Instead of seeing things from only one perspective, we become “open-minded.” The causes of suffering don’t go away, but the context in which they’re happening gets bigger.

“A genuine sense of gratitude has to be rooted in the realization that when I think about all that I am, all that I have and all that I might have achieved, I cannot claim to have done any of this by myself. None of us is really “self-made.” Says EJ Dionne, a Washington Post columnist. “We must all acknowledge the importance of the help, advice, comfort and loyalty that came from others.”

"The one thing all humans have in common is that each of us wants to be happy," says Brother David Steindl-Rast, a monk and interfaith scholar. And happiness, he suggests, is born from gratitude. "Two things have to come together for someone to be grateful: First, we have to experience something we really like, and the second is that it has to be a gift. In other words, it must be a free gift — we haven’t bought it, we haven’t traded it in, we haven’t earned it. It is really a gift to us. When these two things come together — something that we really like is given to us — then spontaneously, in every human being, that joy rises up. It is something that happens once in a while – that gratefulness triggers joy. But we can live in such a way where we are constantly triggering joy. That is, if we realize that every moment is a given moment. Every moment is a gift. ..And with this moment is given to us opportunity. .. And to respond to that opportunity, moment by moment by moment as a free gift, releases that joy that we are really looking forward to as human beings. inspiring lesson in slowing down, looking where you’re going, and above all, being grateful."

But a call to responsibility lies at the heart of gratitude. If faith without works is dead, gratitude without generosity of spirit is empty. By reminding us of how much we owe to others, or to social arrangements, or to fate, or to God, gratitude creates an obligation to repay our debts by repairing injustices and reaching out to those whom luck has failed. Gratitude is a response to acts of love. It demands more of the same — nothing more, nothing less.

For it is said that gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend.

Perhaps Milton said it best: " Gratitude bestows reverence, allowing us to encounter everyday epiphanies, those transcendent moments of awe that change forever how we experience life and the world."