Lessons in Gratitude Day 721

Posted on July 4, 2013 by mtchamblee

Whee, it has been a very long day. I rose this morning at a little after 4:00 a.m. preparing to get on the road at 5:00 to head out to a family reunion in Gainesville, GA. My sister Sandy and I decided to undertake the drive and had determined that leaving before sunup made the best sense to beat the holiday traffic heading down toward the beach. I’m grateful this evening for traveling mercies: the driving was relatively uneventful except for a few minutes during which heavy rain pelted down faster and harder than the wipers could clear well. We slowed down, put the flashers on and rolled on.

There’s nothing quite like a road trip, especially when you’re traveling with family or good friends. Sandy and I talked and laughed all the way through four states and 600 miles. It reminded me of my drive across the country with my brother Alan. Stories, reminiscences, rest stops, pit stops, fuel stops (and today, Dairy Queen stops). It’s been fun. Of course, now 17 hours later I am ready to conk out. One of my cousins, here for the reunion has said she’s going to drop by for a visit this evening. I hope he decides to wait until tomorrow.

I would love to write about the interesting conversations I anticipate ainv as part of the reunion this weekend. Most of these “kinfolk” I’ve never met; I only know them through their presence on our family tree. Exhaustion and road weariness have settled in and so I will sign out now. I look forward to discovering more interesting information about my family that will unfold tomorrow and Saturday before Sandy and I hop back in the car and head back up to the DC metro area.

And while I am expressing gratitude for family, let me  say how grateful I am to my sister Ruth for guest blogging yesterday. I sprung the idea on her late last night and in fairly short order she produced a wonderful piece. Look forward to hearing from her more often, along with occasional guest blogs from other members of my family. I am also grateful to my sister Sandy for being such a good sport in agreeing to drive down to Georgia–a 10-hour drive when she really would have preferred to fly. In the end I think we both enjoyed the time spent together driving and will look forward to good times with cousins and family this weekend. But for now, it’s time to take my rest.

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Lessons in Gratitude Day 720

Posted on July 4, 2013 by mtchamblee

Below is a guest blog from my beloved sister, Ruth Chamblee. I am in deep appreciation and gratitude for her contribution tonight.

_________

It’s probably no coincidence that my sister asked me to guest blog tonight. In fact, I don’t really believe in coincidence. Things happen for a reason. So why me; why tonight?

Just the other day I was thinking about my sister’s dedication to writing this blog and marveling at the strength of will it must have required (and still requires) on many occasions. She writes when she’s weary and the hour grows late. She writes when she’s busy and barely has a spare moment. She writes when she’s cranky and struggles to dredge up a grateful thought. The fact that she’s written this singularly focused blog for 700+ days is simply amazing to me. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Only someone who knows my sister’s personality very well and knows the full story of her annus horribilis (Queen E), can truly appreciate how brave and strong she is. I think I would have curled up in a ball and pulled the covers over my head, but not her.  She refused to give in. She got up every day and worked, exercised, volunteered, socialized, did whatever was necessary to keep herself together, and yes, she expressed gratitude, in spite of everything.

Brave and strong. She’s always been that way, even when we were little. Slayer of creepy spiders. First one into the dark, scary room. Teaching me to stand up to bullies. Giving me support and courage during my own stressful times. Convincing me that I can do things I’m not so sure I can do…like write this blog! I guess it’s pretty obvious by now that I am very, very grateful for my big sister and friend. I’m grateful that she is my role model for courage, strength, and perseverance. I’m grateful that these qualities helped her to weather her own personal storms. And I’m grateful that they will allow her to thrive in this next chapter of her life.

So, to answer my earlier question—I guess it was just time for one of her biggest fans to turn the tables and express heartfelt gratitude for her.

Ruth

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Lessons in Gratitude Day 719

Posted on July 2, 2013 by mtchamblee

Tonight was destined to be a night either for simple gratitude or a spin of the wheel. The wheel won, and I’m glad to post a piece from September 2011 in which I express gratitude for my daughter. I continue to be grateful for her life and how it’s unfolding. Enjoy this brief post

I just got off the phone with my daughter,Michal. It was a quick check-in call to see how she was doing. When I’d spoken to her earlier in the evening she’d been struggling with some emotional stuff. It isn’t easy when your “child”is crying on the other end of the phone and you can’t put your arms around her and offer physical comfort. It doesn’t matter if she’s 1 or 21,she’s still your child and you still want to make it all better. At least I still do. But of course I know that the more grown my children get the more I need to step back, let go and allow them to learn navigate their own waters. Easier said than done, that.

I am so proud and grateful for who my daughter is becoming. I watched her struggle through two really rough patches in her life–the first when she was around eight years old as she struggled to come to grips with her father leaving and our subsequent divorce, and again around 15 as she tried to adjust to our moving to California from the town where she’d spent most of her life. Both times she seemed to get lost in the midst of her grief, pain, sorrow, and anger to the point where I couldn’t find the sweet-spirited, open hearted, loving little girl I knew her to be. There were times when she’d look at me with such sadness in her eyes as if she were saying,“I’m in here, Mommy. Please help me.” As a teenager, she was rebellious, angry, sullen and tried to get herself into all kinds of trouble. But even when she was being “bad” and no matter what she did, I believe she knew I could still look in her eyes and see who she really was. I never stopped believing in her and never gave up on her.

I think it’s safe to say that she “squeaked”into college–though her grades weren’t awful, she was still fortunate to be admitted to the schools she applied to. In college, something magical happened: she blossomed. Oh not at first, it took her a while to adjust to being there. During her first month up at school she got mononucleosis and had to come home for a week to start to get healthy. And it seemed like each semester some drama or other seemed to befall her. But each year she’s gotten stronger academically, become more engaged in campus life, and more sure of what she wants to do when she graduates next spring.  She still struggles now and then, like she did this afternoon; but she’s continuing to develop the tools and the inner strength to pull herself out of them.

I am grateful for Michal, and I’m grateful to her. She’s handled adversity with courage, strength, and grace. She can also be very, very silly, which I also appreciate. She laughs at all manner of things, is goofy, and finds humor in a wide variety of places. She’s smart and talented and is a wonderful singer-songwriter. And has just started writing her own gratitude blog. Gee, she sounds like a chip off the old block!

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Lessons in Gratitude Day 718

Posted on July 1, 2013 by mtchamblee

Yesterday I got a chance to briefly live out one of my current deep fears: what I would do if something suddenly happened to my four-legged roommate and dear friend, Honor. Last night I was out to dinner with a friend when I received one of those dreaded phone calls from my sister letting me know that Honor had been injured when she was attacked by another dog. Honor has often spent time over at Sandy’s house with Sandy’s husband Al and their four-legged friend Blue. On this particular occasion, a third dog was in the mix; they were dog sitting with their “granddog” Siri. Unexpectedly, Siri bit Honor, tearing off a piece of her right ear.

As I sat listening to Sandy tell me that she was going to put me on speakerphone with the vet and then listening to the vet rambling on about what she was going to do and how she would have to put Honor under anesthesia and and and…my mind sort of wandered. I knew that the injury wasn’t life-threatening, so I didn’t need to rush over to the hospital. By the time I dropped my friend off at the Metro station and got back to my sister’s house, they had long since left the hospital. We talked briefly and made a plan about what would happen if the vet called and was able to do the surgery on Honor’s ear tonight. If she couldn’t do the surgery in the evening they’d keep her overnight. So, I went home without my pup.

I can’t tell you how many times I looked for her, expected her to follow me, tried to tiptoe past her bed only to remember she wasn’t in it. It was weird. And I realized, as I often have, how much I depend on her presence to entertain, distract, uplift, annoy, and delight me on a daily basis. I knew it was going to be hard moving and living here by myself just me and Honnie after an entire lifetime living with other people: parents and siblings, roommates, spouses and partners, children. I realized that when I moved here with Honor it was the first time in my life I’ve lived by myself without another human being, that is. But I had Honnie. And for the first time last night I knew what it was like to not have her here and to know that she was sleeping away from home and family in a cage at the animal hospital.

Recently a friend of mine lost his old dog; the “pup” simply grown so old he couldn’t get around any more and was falling down, unable to eat, scarcely able to move. My friend had him put to sleep and though he knew it was the right thing to do, agonized over it and then understandably lamented the loss of his beloved friend. And now he lives alone. I had a glimpse of that last night and though Honor wasn’t seriously injured, it is inevitable that some day, may it be many years from now, she is going to die.

I am grateful to still have my little friend with me. I am grateful for the swift actions of my brother in law, who restrained Siri and kept her from doing more serious damage to Honor, and my sister who quickly scooped up Honor in a blanket, keeping pressure on her wound and the two of them getting her to the hospital. (Sandy even had the presence of mind to put on ice and bring along the piece of Honor’s ear that had been torn off in the attack. It could not be reattached.) Both of their care and quick thinking meant that Honor was seen by the vet and cared for within 15 minutes of her having been injured. I am grateful to both of them.

Tonight I am grateful to be able to look out past the foot of my bed and see my friend Honor curled up in her bed as usual. I’m sure she’s not totally comfortable–she has to wear the “cone of shame” to keep her from scratching the bandage off her ear and tearing the incision–but she’s here and resting. In the next day or two I think she’ll be back to her upbeat, playful self. Honor is an important part of my life and I would have been deeply affected if I had lost her. I remain grateful for her presence in my home and in my life.

The Patient

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Lessons in Gratitude Day 717

Posted on June 30, 2013 by mtchamblee

Two years ago today I wrote the first lesson in gratitude. It was 454 words and the beginning of a journey that would take me through different iterations of this blog.  I am grateful for what it has taken to continue to write daily expressions of gratitude for the things with which I am blessed to have in my life. There have been days when I have been stressed out and tired and the last thing I wanted to do was to write something about being grateful–which is exactly the right time to do it. And so here I am this evening in the midst of a variety of challenges and  concerns still grateful after all these months.

Tonight I spun the RNG wheel to invite the fates to find me a good past post to share. It has been a long, odd day and I am a little too tired to write. So please enjoy this post from last February, Day 222. It speaks to the idea that it’s possible and actually quite important to be able to express gratitude even on days when things don’t feel good. Because the fact of the matter is that even when days don’t go quite as we’d hoped or planned, there are still things to be grateful for. It’s on days like these (and I’ve had a few lately) that it’s even more important to recognize and acknowledge the blessings in my life.

Today I had the blues. It hurts to admit that after having such a stupendous day yesterday, but that’s sort of how this goes, that is how my life plays out sometimes. And, that’s alright. It has to be. I am grateful for every day that I draw breath and walk on the planet. Sometimes I’m going to feel good, sometimes I’m going to have the blues. Heck, sometimes I might even have the blues for two days in a row or feel good for a whole week. And, it’s all okay. This morning when the liquid anxiety coursed through me as I did yesterday, I sat up and wrote in my journal. Unlike yesterday when I wrote I did not feel immediately better and go on to have a phenomenal day. I was sluggish and tired and cranky and weepy at times, and yet here I am at the end of the day focusing on gratitude and the good things in my life. The practice and process of being grateful doesn’t have to be difficult or dramatic or even particularly deep. It simply begins where you are in a given moment.

For me, throughout the day I look around me at the many good things, the blessings that surround me and say thank you. Thank who? That actually depends in part on what you believe. I suppose if I believed that I earned every single good thing in my life I would be grateful to myself. But that sounds a bit ridiculous, doesn’t it? Where does the strength come from that gets me out of bed in the morning,particularly on a day like this? What gives me the ability to smile and laugh and experience the full range of emotions that flow through me over the course of a single day? How is it that this incredibly complex collection of cells that we call our bodies functions as it does on a moment-by-moment basis? I can’t take credit for these or so many other blessings that are in my life. So, I thank God. I can’t help it, it’s just there.

So on a day like today when I can’t seem to get my act together and feel low energy and fighting off the blues, I still have so much to be grateful for. When I get “stuck”on trying to figure out what I have to be grateful for (sitting watching the cursor blinking on my nifty laptop computer, powered by electricity that I don’t generate by myself), I need only quiet myself and focus on my breath, the beating of my heart, the blood coursing through my veins, my ability to see the screen and reason the meaning of the words I am typing. As I’m waiting for my muse to show up to inspire me to write about something I’m grateful for I can relax on my soft bed, the humming sound of the heater blowing warm air down on me, listening to quiet music in the background. Perhaps I can trot downstairs and open the fridge and get myself a snack or can jump in my car and drive over to the grocery store and pick something up. I am grateful for all the things I don’t even realize that I take for granted.

I often used to end days like today just being grateful that the day was over. I am grateful to be at the close of the day and end it knowing that it could’ve been better and it could have been a whole lot worse. I will wake tomorrow morning with a renewed sense of the possibilities the day holds. I will once again draw upon the wellspring of energy that replaces itself each day; it must or I wouldn’t get out of bed in the morning. One writer says that “the mercies of God are without end; they are new every morning.” Thank goodness! May we all experience gratitude for the many good things in our lives, and even the challenges that come along for the experiences they provide and the lessons they teach. May we all be free from suffering and the causes of suffering. So be it!

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Lessons in Gratitude Day 716

Posted on June 29, 2013 by mtchamblee

I am grateful this evening for the music that permeates my life. It connects me to my deepest emotions; a song can transport me immediately to a different emotional-mental space. Yesterday I wrote about the impact that the song “Home” from the musical “The Wiz” has on me. It scarcely matters where I am or what I’m doing, that song touches a place in my heart in an immediate almost instantaneous way. Songs like that are part of the soundtracks of our lives: lovers associate certain songs with their loved ones, “Remember when we danced to that song?” Some songs I can remember my father singing or whistling, and certain songs never failed to make my mother cry. There were those I sang to my children, sometimes making them up on the spot. Songs that comforted or silly ones that brought on the giggles. Music continues to play such a vital role in my life. And now my children each make their own music, compose and play their own beautiful music. It makes my heart smile to hear them play and sing, to watch them create and know that I had a hand in passing that love along to them, though it would have no doubt developed anyway.

I grew up listening, dancing to Motown artists and the Beatles–my older sisters had stacks of 45s we used to play on the old record player. As a freshman in high school I listened to all kinds of music, but it wasn’t until I started playing the guitar that I really discovered the power of music in my life. One of the first of the lessons in gratitude blogs I wrote back on July 5, 2011, was about my discovering my voice through my music. I am sharing that posting again this evening as I prepare to wind myself down after a long week. From LIG Day Four:

“This afternoon I had the opportunity to sit outside and enjoy the company of friends while listening to a singer-songwriter play her guitar and sing for a couple of hours. I thought about my own songwriting and the role that music has played in my life in the nearly 40 years since I first picked up my guitar.

When I was in high school in the early 70s,I wanted to be a writer–fiction mostly,but I also wrote poetry. It was frustrating to me that all my poetry rhymed. I grew up in an era when non-rhyming poetry was much more hip and cool than verse that rhymed. But no matter what I did my rhyming poetry was always way better than anything I ever came up with that didn’t have rhyme or a particular meter. I was quite dejected about this for quite some time. Then at age 15 I started playing the guitar and at one point it finally dawned on me that I wasn’t writing rhyming poetry–I was writing song lyrics!

Once I reached that realization,my life was literally no longer the same. My songwriting gave me a voice I’d never had before,a way to express feelings and fears,sadness and angst I would not have been able to express to another person. It allowed people to know me in a way that I was too shy to otherwise make myself known. I could offer my music as a personal gift to friends and family. It was something uniquely mine.

Music was a salve to my soul. When I was sad I could pour that sadness into my music and the sweet sounds that came from my guitar and singing gave voice to that sorrow. I could be angry,I could be lonely,I could be many things through music that I didn’t know how to be without it. And that emotion often reached out and touched the people who listened. There was an exchange of energy and spirit between me and the listener that was palpable to each of us. Music has that kind of power.

So today as I sit writing this I realize how grateful I am to have the gift of music in my life and I realize that it’s been far too long since I actively gave myself over to it. I think when I finish,I’ll get up and tune my guitar and refresh myself with a heart song. Nothing quite revives my spirit as when I connect to the divine through music.”

I’m going to take a few moments this evening before I take my rest to tune up my 12-string and play and sing for a little while.  Close my eyes and sigh and let the music feed my soul and let my heart fill with gratitude for the gift of song.

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Lessons in Gratitude Day 715

Posted on June 28, 2013 by mtchamblee
When I think of home, I think of a place, where there’s love overflowing.
I wish I was home, I wish I was back there with the things I’ve been knowing.
Wind that makes the tall trees bend into leaning,
Suddenly the raindrops that fall have a meaning,
Sprinklin’ the scene, makes it all clean.
Dorothy from the musical, The Wiz

This morning as I was driving to work something unexpected happened. I was listening and singing to a play list that I call “Mellow Mamas,” belting out each familiar tune as it started playing (including “Alfie” that I wrote about the other day.) As the first strains of music began (including the sweet tone of a bell ringing) of the song “Home” from the Broadway musical The Wiz began tears sprang to my eyes and even as I began to sing along with the familiar and much-loved words, spilled over. In some ways I have spent my whole life searching for “home,” and even though as a quasi-enlightened adult I recognize that the “home” that I’m looking for doesn’t really exist outside of my own mental/emotional/spiritual construction of it. In other words, the home am longing for, missing, wishing I was “there” is not a physical place at all–though to be sure, place is an important consideration for me in home whether I find it or create it. I am searching for a place where there’s “love overflowing,” where there’s a sense of comfort, familiarity, a place where I can exhale, be myself and know that I am totally accepted for exactly who I am with all my flaws and foibles.

I have known for a long time that to find what I am looking for I need only take the journey inward to begin to define and then create for myself the home that I’m looking for. As I look back at the songs I have written they are filled with references to a desire to find this mythical place I call home. But even though I have yet to find and/or create it, I am grateful nonetheless for some of the places I’ve been able to make into home.

I think part of my weeping was the sense of nostalgia in the song, or perhaps I was simply feeling nostalgic. I think when life gets to be a little bit too much I find myself missing my parents, missing the feeling of home that existed back when I was a child and felt safe. It didn’t mean life was always fun and carefree, but as the song says, “It sure would be nice to be back home where there’s love and affection.” Home, as imperfect as it sometimes was, was still a place where I felt and experienced love and where I developed deep ties and connections not only to my family, but to the idea of family–that there were people in the world who love and put up with you. While that’s not true for everyone–some people have family of choice versus family by blood or genetics–it was true for me. So the idea of home always has people connected to it. I’m sure that living by myself sometimes makes this particular longing more acute.

It has been a long, trying, week and there have been times when weariness has overtaken me. I am grateful for the small release of tears I experienced today driving in to work as I listened to the song. It reconnected me to an aspect of my journey that I had lost track of. The search for home is not painful. I’m learning and growing along the way. As Dorothy goes on to point out in the song, I too have “had my mind spun around in space, yet I’ve watched it growing…” I’ve been through a fair amount of drama over the past few years, and in spite of how painful those times were, I also know I grew tremendously in strength and character through what I experienced. I wouldn’t necessarily want to relive it, but I definitely wouldn’t trade what I learned in the process.

I am grateful for the home I have now. It isn’t all that I hope for yet, but I am working toward making it what I need for it to be. And for now that’s a very good thing. Here are the remaining lyrics to the song “Home,” written by Charlie Smalls back in 1975.

Maybe there’s a chance for me to go back there
Now that I have some direction
It sure would be nice to be back home
Where there’s love and affection
And just maybe I can convince time to slow up
Giving me enough time in my life to grow up
Time be my friend, let me start again
Suddenly my world has changed it’s face
But I still know where I’m going
I have had my mind spun around in space
And yet I’ve watched it growing

If you’re list’ning God
Please don’t make it hard to know
If we should believe in the things that we see
Tell us, should we run away
Should we try and stay
Or would it be better just to let things be?

Living here, in this brand new world
Might be a fantasy
But it taught me to love
So it’s real, real to me

And I’ve learned
That we must look inside our hearts
To find a world full of love
Like yours, like mine
Like home…

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Lessons in Gratitude Day 714

Posted on June 27, 2013 by mtchamblee

Today has been one of those days that Mama warned me about. I don’t really have too much to say about it except that at the conclusion of it I am exhausted to the bone. This morning as I woke up, dragging myself into a sitting position and swinging my feet to the floor blindly feeling for my slippers. In that simple act that took no more than a second or two, I experienced my first conscious feeling and expression of gratitude for the day. Even in my half-awake, pre-coffee stupor, as soon as I swung my feet around and stood up, I thanked God for the free movement of my legs and feet, the balance required to be able to stand and walk unaided, the strength in my legs and lower back supporting me as I tottered off the the bathroom.

Thank goodness for that brief recognition of my gratitude for being mostly able bodied, and while I am aware that I often take for granted the ease with which I move, breathe, speak, think, and so many complex actions, sometimes I am keenly aware of what a gift it really is. For the most part, though, the day was a blur of meetings–many of which were unpleasant–that have left me exhausted here at the end of the day. I was grateful to crawl into my car turn on my audiobook and squint my tired eyes at the road for today’s hour and 26 minute commute home. When I got home I fixed myself a simple dinner, sat down and ate as I continued to listen to the last hour of my audiobook.

I spun the RNG wheel this evening and found (after a few tries) a posting from October 2011 that resonates a bit with where I am at the moment a year and a half later. I am looking forward to finding or creating for myself some space to rest and refresh. Until then I’ll find snatches of peace and tranquility when and where I can in the midst of the madness and be grateful for them.

Tonight I once again express simple gratitude: For the abundance that I have even in the midst of challenges. It doesn’t necessarily show up in dollars and cents (at least not yet), but in so many other ways. I am also grateful for the lessons I am learning through both formal and informal instruction. I have been able to explore various elements of mindfulness meditation–practices and concepts–that are very much in alignment with where my head and heart have been over the past few months. I’ve been able to hear insightful teachings at the East Bay Meditation Center, which I discovered a few months ago, and will be participating in a number of workshops to help me learn more about meditation, loving kindness practice, and other basic tenets of Buddhism that are resonant with where I am at this moment in my life. I have spent some time listening to the insights of teachers like Pema Chodron (http://www.gampoabbey.org/pema-bio.php), whom I find quite accessible and down-to-earth, and like Eckhart Tolle, whom I find a bit more esoteric at times,but also quite insightful.

My spiritual life is still evolving. Although I grew up in a particular Christian religious tradition, there was something missing in it for me. I was definitely a seeker, desiring to know both the “voice” and the will of God, but I wasn’t finding what I was looking for from my early church experiences. Then I went through a period of deep immersion in a very different Christian tradition from what I’d grown up with. And while I learned a lot of things, much of it I learned through pain, oppression, and disillusionment. Somehow I don’t think that’s quite what God had in mind; but, as with so many of my life experiences, I learned to extract the lessons even from the midst of those difficult days. Through it all, I might have lost my faith in religion, but I never lost my faith in God, the Creator, the Great Spirit, the One known by many names. How this faith manifests itself varies wildly. Sometimes my “church” is the outdoors as I walk and commune with the beauty of nature. Sometimes it is in a particularly beautiful piece of music that literally transports me to another realm of being. Sometimes it is simply in the midst of profound silence–the kind I don’t get very often but revel in it when I do.

I used to feel very incomplete, unsettled by not having a formal religious affiliation, denomination, doctrine; but I have learned to be comfortable with the uncertainty of not having one. This is another part of my journey for which there is no definitive answer at the moment. If there is an answer, I’ll remain open and allow it to find me. For the moment, I am simply allowing myself to be with the questions and see where they lead me. I am grateful for the seeking, for the unknown, for the seeking, for being found. I have no idea how it all will work out, and that’s perfectly alright with me…at least in this moment. And of course this moment is all we have. I am spending this particular moment with a sense of deep gratitude.

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Lessons in Gratitude Day 713

Posted on June 26, 2013 by mtchamblee

The United States’ Supreme Court has been busy. The nine people with lifetime appointments to sit on the Court have “handed down” decisions that will affect millions, perhaps tens of millions of people in the United States. I am not a legal scholar and I don’t pretend to even remotely be; in many ways I am an ordinary citizen who is trying to live my life, earn a living, guide my kids, and in a number of small to medium-sized ways try to make a difference in the world. I find myself baffled as I have watched the Supreme Court–these nine intelligent but imperfect people–on one occasion extending freedoms and on another taking them away. Depending on which “side” you are on of the numerous contentious issues decided within the last several days, one could argue either way.

For my part, as one who has actively worked for equity and social justice for most of my adult life I find myself in a state of uncertainty about the impacts of these decisions on my life, on the lives of people I care about, and those millions whom I don’t know but with whom I share some common hopes and dreams. I find myself disheartened by so much of what I see around me that at times I can scarcely take it all in: “man’s inhumanity to man” on display on a daily basis. But even as I watch these decisions being rendered and then dissected line by line, bit by bit, I remind myself that for some engaged in the struggle for equity and freedom it’s just another day.

Freedoms and rights have always been gained through difficult, arduous, painful and often dangerous work–those who hold power over others are loath to give it up and will fight tooth and nail to keep things exactly the way they are. Whatever progress has been made in so many areas was gained in halting, laborious steps–inch by inch, yard by yard, mile by mile. And if recent actions by the courts and legislatures across the country have taken some of that ground back, the people who fought for it will go back, regroup, and take it on again. One would hope that everything does not have to be fought for, but if it does, there are always warriors.

What has all this to do with gratitude? Good question. I guess I would respond by saying that I am grateful that people fought and sacrificed and sometimes died for some of the freedoms I enjoy today. My father fought against the Nazis in World War II only to come home to the United States and be treated like a second-class citizen, subject to racism and mistreatment. He fought for civil rights during the 1960s so that millions of disenfranchised US citizens won the right to vote, attend schools and colleges of their choice, have access to the same basic rights and privileges that were supposedly guaranteed to everyone under the constitution. Because of tens of thousands of people like my parents who struggled to gain ground in the push for equality, I am a college-educated, voting citizen who like my parents before me, work in my own small ways to ensure that people who have historically been marginalized and disenfranchised also have access.

I don’t often write about political matters in this blog; it is not what people read a gratitude blog for. And my apologies to those who perhaps don’t share my particular political leanings. Every day when I offer prayers of love and goodwill to all beings, I offer the same prayers for my “enemies” as I do for my “loved ones.” Every day. And to the best of my ability I pray as fervently as I can for them. I am even grateful for that, for it surely is a gift from God that I can do that. In doing that I try to remember that we are “all as frail boats on the sea,” we are all tossed and driven by the winds of fate and my guess is that at our core we share some very basic, fundamental values. I am grateful every time I remember to turn to prayer and forgiveness instead of anger (no matter how “righteous”) and hatred. Sometimes I get tired; it seems as though the fight for equality and justice is endless–and perhaps it is. But so is the strength and resilience of the human spirit. And for that, I am most definitely grateful.

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Lessons in Gratitude Day 712

Posted on June 25, 2013 by mtchamblee

Tonight I am simply too tired to write. And so, without shame I spun the wheel and am reposting a previously written lesson from June 1 of last year. The focus of the post is about the swift passage of time, and as I re-read it I could not help but agree that the days are flying by so fast that I can scarcely keep up with them. I turn around and suddenly another week has past and shortly we will be at the end of June. Here is the post on time written on Day 323. Enjoy!

As I sat thinking about how quickly the days and weeks are passing, I was reminded of one of my favorite quotes on time of which I always only remember the first part, “Time is too slow for those who wait.” I never could remember the rest of it,only the general concept that we each perceive time from different perspectives. In this day of instant information I simply had to go to Google to find the full quote by the writer Henry Van Dyke:

“Time is too slow for those who wait, too swift for those who fear, too long for those who grieve, too short for those who rejoice, but for those who love, time is eternity.”

(Of course Google also attributed a quote that was very much like Van Dyke’s to William Shakespeare,so who knows who really said it first…) Anyway, it seems that how we approach time is all about perspective. But these days so many people I talk to, even young people, all seem to be conscious of the speeding up of our days. When my twenty-one year old daughter says, “Where did the time go?”I shake my head and wonder where indeed?

The other quote about time that stood out for me many years ago occurred during one of the Star Trek movies in which a character says to Captain Jean Luc Picard, “Time is the fire in which we burn.” When I googled that quote it came up as being attributed to two people–one a poet and the other was none other than Gene Roddenberry, creator of the Star Trek series. In the film Captain Picard has the opportunity to live in an alternate time,o ne in which he could live out the life he’d have had if he’d made different choices. In the alternate timeline he marries and has children instead of leading the life of a starship captain boldly going where no one (they used to say “no man”) had gone before. He got the chance to experience things he’d been missing in his life–the connection to a loving life partner, children to nurture and raise, a quiet, contented life. In the end of course he remembered that he was a starship captain and returned to his “real” life of unattached, relatively solitary space exploration “seeking out new life and new civilizations.”

So what does any of this have to do with gratitude? Perhaps not much. Except to say that I am grateful for each day that God gives me on this planet. Some days I make good use of the time I’m given, and others I probably squander it, wishing I could get a do-over. I try to approach my days with the highest intentions possible–to do good where I can, to do no harm where I can’t, to live with as much integrity, compassion, and love as I can. To simply do the best I can with what I am given each day. I am grateful for the time I have with my children–the three of us living together again under one roof for the first time in many months and possibly for the last time in the foreseeable future as they continue into their respective futures and I into mine. I am grateful for times spent with my siblings, either in person or virtually. The times with family are among the most precious to me,and I find myself wishing I could have them much more often than I do.

I am grateful for time and the many ways in which it expresses itself. I am learning as best I can to live in the moment,whatever that moment happens to bring;to stop regretting past actions and decisions and fretting about futures I have no way of knowing will unfold. It’s not easy,this living in the moment thing,but if I can truly learn to savor the moments of my life I will really have accomplished something.

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