Gratitude

I have often a desire to call my parents and say, “Thanks.”  For what?  Whatever I am doing for my kids that they are not grateful for!  I was likely unappreciative in my youth and I want to make up for it.  Thanks for reading to me, getting me out of bed every school day, fulfilling requests for fashion fads, taking me to the doctor for immunizations, giving me pizza money, going to the store at 9:00pm for poster board I forgot to mention I needed the next day, making sure I had toilet paper, soap and shampoo, clean underwear and socks.  My gratitude is tardy.    

Gratitude is defined at by Collins English Dictionary, 2009 at dictionary.com as follows.
                1.  a feeling of thankfulness or appreciation.

A word history is also offered from Online Etymology Dictionary.  Gratitude is from Latin gratus related to Latin gratia which gave us the word “grace.”  So gratitude and grace are related.  Some synonyms of grace listed are “attractiveness, charm, comeliness” and antonyms are “ugliness, stiffness.”

We choose how we present ourselves in the world, on which side of grace from gratitude we wish to fall – attractiveness or ugliness.  Ultimately I suspect our ability to feel gratitude (or not) affects how we appear to ourselves and others – attractive or ugly. 

I can offer a wave when someone lets me into traffic.  I might tell the insolent bag boy who just crammed all my groceries into sacks, “Thanks,” even if he doesn’t make eye contact because without him I’d be negotiating the candy racks from an ineffective, non-strategic position while bagging my own food.   I might send my children’s teachers a note telling them I am grateful they offer their time to educate my child.  Tell my spouse I’m glad he comes home to the chaos every day.  Tell the cosmos I appreciate the inventor of air conditioning because August in South Carolina is really, really hot.  Tell the Universe I am glad the sun is shining.  Tell my daughter that I am thankful for her dedication to success in math.  Tell my son, “Thank you,” for helping his sister tie her shoes.  Thank my youngest for every hug.  Be specific.  Find something.  If I elect to, I can show my kids what gratitude looks like.

I came across a quote from Meister Eckhart recently that stuck with me, “If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, ‘thank you,’ that would suffice.”

 

Gratus

Breathe a bountiful belly full of thanks.  Let your stomach

rise and fill, body bathe in breath of gratitude, every  cell

grows with grace, flows in sheer sea.  Notice gifts, each

being an offering, self and other together connected,

eternal sharing, receiving the divine existence

exhaled from the mouth of God, ours.

Aspiring thus we become living.