writing frustrationWell, so much for a writing discipline. I have not added anything for a week. I could attribute this to any number of factors, but I have to go back to a quote I have near my desk. I’m not at my desk right now so I can’t quote it, but it reminds me that people who don’t get around to writing are no busier than those who do write.

Back to gratitude and grief. My thought for the past few days is that gratitude must extend to the difficulties that brought me to this place in my life. Some of my most valuable lessons came from the most difficult circumstances.

The problem is that while those difficulties were in fact difficult, it was hard to be grateful. As long as I see my circumstance as “difficulties,” I fight against them, deny them, resist them, try to get away from them. It’s only upon reflection that I can recognize how valuable those times were. Genuine gratitude is the capacity to be grateful in the midst of the troubles.

I believe that I am most able to learn from difficult times when I can be in the middle of it and say, “This is tough. I don’t know what will come of it, but this is what life is presenting me. What shall I do now?” I am not a big enough person to express true gratitude for painful circumstances, but I can at least be open and receptive to them, to see them as life’s latest opportunity to teach me something. If I can do that, I don’t get stuck. I am ready for the next lesson inevitably coming my way.