why gratitude matters.

giving thanks when life tests the shit out of you.

Oh, great.

Another gratitude post right before Thanksgiving.

I know. Haven’t writers come up with something better to reflect on this week?

I’m sure a punchier topic is out there but as I sit in my house wearing two sweaters to sweat out the flu while trying not to ruminate too hard over the details of a recent car-flipping accident my family and I were in (for clarity: we were the car that flipped and yes, my child was in the backseat as we were coming home from a pumpkin carving event in town), I have to be grateful. Otherwise, what do I have?

To address the accident: with a healing heart I can report that we’re physically fine. Call it a miracle, angels watching, physics on our side, it wasn’t our time but we’re fine. The wounds we have are psychological that we’re nursing with lots of quiet nights in with Steve Martin and Bill Murray (my son’s favorite actors) movies and popcorn.

But as I look back on this autumn season, that I know, is not quite over yet, I see already that it’s been a season of tests. Testing my resilience…my intuition…my choices…my patience…my faith in myself…as well as in others. There have been disappointments, reliefs, breakthroughs, true colors shown and a few surprises. But what all of these experiences have in common is that they were rooted in gratitude that things could have been worse, a newfound gratitude for my sharpened foresight that now allows me to dodge bullets, and to see that I am continuously learning from my past mistakes. Being a few years into my 40s, I now get to say things like with age comes wisdom. And sure, I may have jowls and deep 11’s but I also have lived experiences that no one can take away and that guide me towards healthy decisions that keep me and my family emotionally safe. (I wish they could predict SUVs plowing down on the wrong side of the small side street but…)

A sense of humor helps, too. Like the friend who gives you three bottles of wine for your birthday as you mark six months of sobriety. The weird things that stay intact after a car accident, like our jack-o-lantern that traveled with us to the emergency room. Or even down to the insignificant like not finding a turkey because the country I live in doesn’t celebrate Thanksgiving. (Turkeys are for Christmas here.)

Gratitude is a tool we use in 12 Step recovery to stay present one day at a time, but it’s not just for overcoming addiction, it really is a life hack (for lack of a better internet phrase du jour) because acknowledging with a warm heart what’s in front of us can only soften our views to what’s around us, which opens ourselves to even more fulfilling experiences. For me, this has been time tested and I’ve relied on this method of thinking even when my logical mind wants to reject it because isn’t complaining and giving back just as hard (like revenge or other useless ego-driven motivations) more satisfying? In a way, sure. But it’s also really counterproductive as negative thinking tends to fester and then reanimate into other parts of our lives in cyclical effect, which is why self-destruction is usually described as a spiral.

I often think of that scene in American Beauty with the plastic bag dancing in the wind and the character stating that there is so much beauty in the world that sometimes he feels like he can’t even take it. The first time I saw that scene I was 18 and it told me more about the character. Reflecting on it now tells me more about myself as every day I try to remember to wipe the cynicism off my middle-aged lenses to see that there is so much beauty around us but we just have to look up from our phones once in a while to see it.

For me it’s the sound of my cat licking his paw under the kitchen table when I write. The glow of the low autumn sun slicing through my streaky kitchen window that I’ll never quite get clean. Talking to the elderly man with the shaky hands in the produce section about persimmons. The nurses who came rushing out of the nursing home our car got tossed in front of like a can of tuna. The tears in my eyes when I saw them a week later when we delivered an autumn bouquet to thank them for their kindness. (They then invited us in for their monthly birthday bash for cake and music where we watched a band cover Michael Jackson’s ‘Billy Jean’. A stand-up bass did the famous bass line while an accordion rocked the synth parts as I noticed some of the wheelchairs inching forward and back in rhythm…like I said, beauty in its purest form.)

Beauty waits in every corner. We just have to be open to see it and that opening might just start with a drop of gratitude.

Happy Thanksgiving.

(gobble. gobble.)