Gratitude in the Grit
This year’s Thankful Tree took a left turn somewhere.
We started with a pretty array of branches and beautifully printed “I am thankful for…” tags. Then, the printer ran out of colored ink, and I couldn’t track down any more card stock. The leaves kept falling off the branches and littering the foyer. The branches insisted on tipping over, threatening to block the front door (and getting caught in the blinds). And consequently, no one was actually using the Thankful Tree.
With one week left until Thanksgiving, it looked like a failure.
So I cut my losses.
We chucked the branches (and swept up the downed leaves). I put all the tags we’d managed to fill out into the pitcher that had originally formed the base of the “tree”. I quickly cut up some strips of paper and threw them and a pen on the basket that holds the pitcher…and called it a day.
And guess what: the Thankful No-Longer-A-Tree is now back in use.
This morning, I even stopped on my way back to bed (with my coffee and Bible) and added a couple Thankfuls myself (sprinklers, a friend’s new baby).
As I did so, I looked at what else was sitting on that basket along with our Thankful Definitely-Not-A-Tree: my husband’s wallet and beret, our car keys, the dog’s leash. In the middle of the detritus of life was the choice to say thank you.
And I think sometimes that’s what we forget. We get busy: running errands, doing work, taking care of all the little things that add up, and we think that we need to set aside a month (well, for some of us, it’s only a day) so that we can really prioritize thanksgiving in our life. We forget that thanksgiving is something we can choose day in and day out, as easily as we grab our keys or slide our wallet into our back pocket.
Often, we want a pretty little altar of thanksgiving to help us feel like gratitude is a Pinterest worthy celebration (and to some extent it is), when what we really need to remember is that gratitude is a choice and a tool and a mindset. It’s as necessary as the clothes we put on and as nourishing as the food we eat.
Often, we find ourself waiting for a break in our schedule so that we can take a deep calming breath and revel in our feel good choice to say thank you.
And what a waste when we could be choosing gratitude because it is radically transformative.
Saying “thank you” is such a small thing, such a simple thing and yet, such a powerful thing. We over complicate it when we try to make it something huge, something so big that the world must come screeching to a halt tor it—and, somehow, we end up making it less than it is in the process. This is a paradox we don’t want to miss or misunderstand.
So this week: don’t wait. Don’t wait for a holiday to remind you. Don’t wait for a beautiful gratitude journal. Don’t wait for someone’s gratitude prompts. Don’t wait for a Thankful Tree worthy of showing up on your Instagram feed. These are all good things, but they’re not necessary things.
The necessary thing—as necessary as walking the dog and not walking out without your keys and wallet—is to do it. To say thank you: for the banana bread baking in the oven, for the sleep your husband managed to snag between phone calls, for the friends who fill your life with laughter, for the corner of quiet you carved out while the kids watched Saturday morning cartoons, for the God who is good and does good (no matter how our circumstances tempt us to think otherwise). The necessary thing is to choose gratitude…and then watch to see how it chooses a different perspective for you.
