Gratitude Happens

Whenever I hear someone say  “have an attitude of gratitude” something inside me cringes a little.  For a long time I thought something was wrong with me.  I heard a speaker say  “It’s not an attitude of gratitude, but a practice of gratitude” and that resonated with me.  Gratitude is hard work, especially when we are in a difficult place.  I know if I start thinking about all the things I am grateful for it might pull me out of a funk.  Yet I resist.  Is it just me?  

This week I was facing some struggles and I made a decision to stay right in the moment.  When my thoughts wandered to “what am I going to do?” I brought them back to the present moment.  How was I in this very moment?  I had a roof over my head, food in my cupboards, a car that ran.  I was not hungry, I was not in any danger.  I was safe in my home with plenty around me.  That is when gratitude happened.  I was so caught off guard that here in the moment with all the wonderfulness of my life in the span of less than a minuted I had gone from sheer panic, to full blown gratitude.  True gratitude where I felt it.  I wasn’t trying to have an attitude of gratitude, I wasn’t trying to feel better by making a list of all the things I was grateful for, but I chose to be very present to the moment I was in and that there was absolutely no lack in that moment.  That’s when I began to dance.

Are you “Dancing in the Moment?”
Coach Laurie  

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