Thanksgiving is a great reminder. And we need them. Because whatever we have and see every day becomes less important to us. We have it. There’s nothing to do here. Time to move along.
Finding meaning and using our time means we want to achieve something with the day. We want to have purpose. To matter – to others but, more importantly, to ourselves. We don’t want to get complacent and be less that we think we should be, than we dream of being.
“Be less than you can be!” will never be a lyric in a commercial.
Learning To See It
A quick story: a well-travelled friend once called me rich. I laughed, of course, because I was a broke high school student at the time and my family were never considered wealthy. But then she asked a question.
“Do you have a car?” she asked.
Rather than quibble about the fact that the car I took to school was my parent’s and I was a mooch, I chose the explanation that make me feel better and answered,”Yes.”
“Then, you’re rich,” she said with an I-told-you-so look in her eye. I wisely waited for her to explain.
“Where I grew up no one had cars,” she continued. “We all rode buses or walked and the busses were full to the point of people hanging onto the sides and riding on top.” I knew this to be true.
“Anyone with their own car, no matter how old or wrecked, was very rich.” She ended with this.
“You Have No Idea What You Have!”
The Right Hemisphere
From that moment on I saw my car. Really saw it. I didn’t complain because it wasn’t fast or new or red or impressive. I didn’t slink down and try to wish away the four-door-family-land-yacht shame.
I saw it, for the first time, as a gift, a blessing I hadn’t earned. It was as if I’d been taking a miracle for granted and had suddenly been hit in the eye with the truth – I hadn’t done anything at all to deserve it.
I had done nothing in my short life to earn the right to be born in the hemisphere I occupied.
Parents
It was impossible to deserve the great, hard-working, car-owning parents I had. I didn’t even understand what bad parents were until I hit college and a friend’s dad stole his self-earned college fund. I never saw that friend again.
Best selling author Dean Koontz’s father was an alcoholic sociopath that tried to kill him. Why didn’t I have that Dad? No answer.
Freedom
The freedoms I enjoyed were reserved only for royalty in other times and places. Some of my ancestors were slaves and political prisoners. Arbitrary rule and cruel power are the historical norms.
There are many places where if you can manage to own a car your travel is severely restricted by borders and roadblocks. Why can I drive the length of a continent without fear or passport? No answer.
Love
There has never been a time in my life when I wasn’t loved. My wife took over this dubious duty after long service by my parents. My children love me without any logically supportable cause.
I spent Thanksgiving being chased by a crawling ninja of joy who called me Gan Da Da over and over again. Trust me, there is nothing I’ve ever done in my life to merit the overwhelming love I felt when Coraline fell asleep in Granddaddy’s arms after dinner.
You Don’t Deserve It
I’m sorry to be so blunt but if you think you’ve earned your blessings then you’re wrong. So very wrong.
Don’t beat yourself up. You’ve probably just drifted into a dissatisfied habit of seeking the best you can be and always looking for something better. That’s not so bad. However . . .
But do not spent another day on this planet walking around blessing blind – sightless to your obvious unearned graces.
It’s rude, arrogant and the person it hurts the most is you, yourself. It’s like the teenager in my kid’s school who had a $90,000 sports car and was upset because his father, who bought them both, tooled around in the same car customized to the tune of $120,000.
How can you have a car whose value approaches the median home price in the state where I was born and still be unhappy? Apparently it’s easy. Just keep your eyes laser focused on the car you don’t have.
It’s All About The Attitude
Dean Koontz is a remarkably happy man but it doesn’t have anything to do with the $20,000,000 or so he earned last year. He could always focus on the fact that he was only the 11th highest paid author of last year and remain miserable.
But no. He was happy before last year. He even says he had a happy childhood. With psycho dad.
Instead, he says it’s because he made a decision. His personal mantra is:
Happiness is a choice.
If Dean Koontz was happy as a child, it would be downright ungrateful for me to be miserable. If I have a car, even if it does currently need brakes, then I should see it for the blessing that it is. If I am loved, then I should be deliriously giddy, because who would sign up for that?
If we (currently) live in a country that takes a national holiday off to consider our blessings, then we should consider the outrageous blessing of time to “see” our good fortune and appreciate it. Even McDonald’s is closed!
Black Friday
If, however, you are one of the employees relegated to long hours of abuse and craziness during Black Friday, which now starts at sundown on our national day of gratefulness, then my prayers and blessings are with you.
I beseech you on behalf of all such underpaid, under appreciated souls to be patient – or better yet, stay home. Or maybe you could take up my mantra . . .
Be nice to Wal-Mart employees.
You could be working there waiting on the likes of you. Trust me, that’s a blessing. Count it.
Photo: Cranberry Candles by Chris Potako via Flickr
Having a car is indeed something to be thankful. Having parents…grandparents…I think each of us has a perspective and bring something different to the table as a reminder (a good thing).
When I met my husband over a decade ago, he didn’t tell me he was a police officer at first. A test sort of to be sure we had things in common minus the uniform factor. So after 5 minutes on our first date, we rather knew. But a year later we married, and I heard a lot of stories from him and his dad (also a career Sgt at the same Sheriff’s office). And those stories make you think about lives we don’t see, but do see on COPS. But did you know there are stories that aren’t even on COPS? There is a point in this about being thankful if you can hang with me. My husband happened to do his dissertation on international prostitution and slave selling. Yes, it still goes on. If you do hear about it, it’s usually some blurb in the newspaper that doesn’t even graze the subject. My husband doesn’t speak of it often, but he has a heart for that because it’s so deep and tough on the men and women. Talk about lives that are utterly destroyed at every level / physically, emotionally, spiritually, and often from very very young ages. Yes, a tough subject, but that’s why he studied it. Someone needs to. He even went overseas and went to some houses in a country I won’t name, to see it first hand. You have to know the enemy if you ever have to battle it. Because that’s his intent. Being in the third largest jail system in the U.S, and near both a land and sea border, it’s not if, but when and how often he will encounter it. Every once in a while he comes home and briefly tells me he told ICE to investigate someone on suspicion of selling girls etc. he is unfortunately and usually right in his suspicions.
I don’t mean to talk about such an uncomfortable subject. I’m certainly not trying to make anyone upset…but I know I have to face the uncomfortable and be thankful. His goal is to help people in a thankless profession. That’s why I mention it. Being on the end of a profession that currently gets quite a bit of bad press. Already thankless, then something bad happens and getting put through the ringer. It’s his way of turning what he does into something positive – he doesn’t care about pats on the back. He just wants to save lives (physically or mentally).
Switching up here…On a personal level, my husband remembers being little and his mom was sick (and I don’t mean the flu). She would sadly forget to feed him and his sister. So he is very thankful for his food even today, and can’t stand food waste. And at work he faces some of the toughest things he will not even come home and tell me, even though I’m not do much of an “ewwww” girly girl. He just wants me to not be tainted. I’ve never been in a jail even to visit someone. He’s very thankful for that – seriously. Interesting huh? He comes home, and is thankful our home walls are a soothing neutral soft cream color and not stark white. He can relax when he is home. He is thankful for our plantation shutters that shut out noise and light. Little things…
We all have things and perspectives. My grandmother taught me to pay attention to those working behind the scenes and to thank them, saying hello by name, remembering them at holidays, etc…at church, the cooks, janitors, deacons, nursery staff who aren’t seen. Personally, in the last few years, I’ve been in incredible pain – and because of it I’ve actually realized I knew little of how to effectually communicate about myself and specifically about problems that some think aren’t so. I used to hit my head on a wall when people didn’t take me seriously and it forced me to learn how to dig deep, find the words and actually communicate instead of getting angry. Words are powerful. I love reading Jefferson and Washington. Every word was a gem to them. And Im thankful for my pain, in that very odd way in the ability to put anger aside and focus on communicating. It’s interesting, I will say.
These are examples – and quite a wide range, but on purpose. If you met me or my husband on the street, it would be tough to guess what makes us tick and for what we are thankful. And that’s the point with each of us. All of it matters.
God has indeed blessed us.
We are blessed indeed.
Awesome as always and goes along with the message I’ll be preaching this coming Sunday. I might even quote ya if ya don’t mind! Keep writing and encouraging us all. We are “Thankful” for your insights on thankfulness!!