Gratitude

I've been thinking about gratitude a lot lately - for the past couple of months in fact.  I think about how we all seem to take the little things in the world for granted, how we focus on the negative, and get stuck in the belief that nothing good ever happens.  Good things, amazing things, happen all the time but we may miss them because they happen every day or they seem insignificant.  They are insignificant because we make them that way.  

Think about the last sunset you saw, or how the sky was pink or orange at dusk.  That beauty happens all of the time, but we may be too busy to notice...  it's amazing when nature presents us with a perfect painting of the sky.  I saw a nearly-full moon the other night, perfectly framed by clouds and a darkening sky.  I reveled in the moment.  

We had a severe hailstorm here a couple days ago.  There were broken windows (both car and house), roofs that were destroyed, cars with massive damage, and some of the most severe water damage I have ever seen in the grocery store down the street.  I have a one-inch crack in the windshield of my car, Rob and Matt's cars have some major hail damage, and our mint and sunflowers are shredded (the mint is already recovering, go figure).  Our roof may have hail damage - we can't tell until we can clean off the vegetation - but it did not leak.  We were so lucky!  I am so grateful that we survived the storm safe (physically, property, emotionally) while some of those around us were not as lucky.  Even our insurance agent had some major damage to her office which isn't covered (flood insurance, yeikes!).

I am grateful that my sons are safe and happy, that my daughter has people she can depend on, and that my husband is more engaged in his job.  Even a small financial setback we will experience over the next two months gives me something to be thankful for - more time with him at home.  Gratitude, as I see it, is a choice - if you make the choice to be grateful, you have the opportunity to be happier, to see more beauty in your life, and to understand that life isn't all bad, it's a mixture of all experiences.