For a couple of years at Thanksgiving when I was a teenager, my family and the family we spent holidays with, all went around the room and said what we were thankful for. Being a pimply faced thirteen year old, naturally I resisted at first, but I went along with it because they threatened to take away my cranberry sauce (yes, I love it from the can #dontjudge). I wasn’t happy at home at the time—verbal barbs and abuse were thrown like grenades on the daily—and I thought I didn’t have much to be thankful for. I was sad, angry, and tired. But looking around the room, in that moment, I remember that I did have a roof over my head and food in my belly. And by verbalizing my thankfulness, it made all those problems seem slightly smaller—if only for a few moments.
I’m thinking we need to have mini-thanksgivings (batteries… and turkey not included)—a five minute “holiday” each day to check in with ourselves on what we’re thankful and grateful for.
Write it down, pray about it, make it your mantra, mutter it under your breath. But take the time. Remembering the good things in life, even if they are few in number at the moment, will help make the bad things seem a little less giant, and may even lead to you finding the space to eliminate one or more of the elements you deem negative in your life.
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