Thankful people are happy people

We do tend to obsess about the weather don’t we?  It’s a bit of a cliché that we’re always talking about it.  And I wonder how many of us have been guilty of complaining a bit (or even a lot) about the heat during this unusual and gloriously hot summer?  Memory is a funny thing isn’t it?  How quickly some of us have forgotten the snow, the rain, the cold, the floods.  And back in the winter when it was so cold and the cold went on week after week after week, all we wanted was sun.  And we complained that we probably wouldn’t get a summer!  How wrong we were!  So do we really spend all year complaining about having the wrong weather and wanting what we haven’t got?  It can feel like that can’t it?  And is that also true of our lives?  Do we spend all year complaining about the life we have and how different it is from the life we really want?  Do we forget to notice what we DO have?

There’s a lovely practice that some folks do where each day or evening, they write down on a piece of paper something they are thankful for and put it in a jar.  Some people call it counting their blessings or doing their gratefuls.  I’ve heard it called all sorts of things.  And by writing them down and keeping them, they can look at them again – especially if they want a little lift or simply want to remind themselves of what’s good in their lives.

Even if you don’t go as far as writing them down and keeping them, today I’m going to invite you to start a deliberate daily practice of appreciation.  Spending even a few moments thinking about what’s good in our lives can help to see more of what’s right there in front of us.

"It is not happy people who are thankful, it is thankful people who are happy."