I am not quite sure who said the last thing to discover water would be a fish is, but whoever it was, thank you. Sometimes we are like the fish, it is not until you take us out of our fish bowl that we become conscious of all the blessings in our life. Thich Nhat Hanh in his book Peace Is Every Breath, tells the story about how he remembered to be grateful for the water when the plumbing broke down. Sometimes I forget to give thanks for the electricity, until we have a power outage. I forget to give thanks for my dishwasher until it stops working. I had forgotten what a gift it is to go to the bathroom until I woke up one morning and was unable to urinate. How many things happen in our daily lives that we forget to give thanks for or do not even think of as blessings until we are suddenly and unexpectedly deprived of them
As I shared in the newsletter and elsewhere, for years I have been keeping a gratitude journal. Each morning I write down five things I am grateful for. It is an awesome way to begin the morning by giving thanks and being positive. However, I realized recently that I tend to focus on those things I am conscious of, people, places, things, etc. So now, I am being intentional about considering one thing I have been consciously thankful for in the past.
Doing so was not as hard as I thought it would be. Instead one thing led to another to another.
For example, a few weeks ago at Love & Inspiration, we began by giving thanks for indoor plumbing, which led to us being grateful for the external plumbing which brought the water to our homes, which lead to us giving thanks for those who developed, designed and maintained the water delivery and purification system. This led us to be grateful for water in general, for the water to wash our faces, our bodies, our hair, to wash our dishes, to wash our clothes, to brush our teeth, to flush the toilet, etc.
So for those of you who are keeping a gratitude journal, I invite you to journal with me about at least one thing each day that you have never consciously given thanks for.