…independent of circumstances, trusting its ability to buoy us even in the roughest of times. But I think somewhere along the line I got complacent. I started to expect the steady rise of all things good, set back only periodically with the hard stuff. Then after 2016 and certainly in 2020 it just felt like the light dimmed and dimmed. Covid to chronic illness relapse to Long Covid marked the passage back into really heavy and challenging times. I think I had swapped navigating the light interrupted only occasionally by the heavy, for living predominantly in the heavy while once again reaching for the light. One thing I’ve learned from all these years walking by Gratitude Girl’s side is that gratitude is sometimes like a lighthouse shining a vast beacon of light through the fog. But other times gratitude is just a thread that helps you feel your way in the dark. I can’t pretend to say things are easy right now. Also won’t pretend we are more battered than anyone else out there. (A mentor once told me, “there is no hierarchy of grief” - and I believe that is true.) But gratitude + grief = griefitude. And that’s a formula I’ve learned really can get you through. I guess upon reflection what I’m trying to say is that aftrrr all these years of “365 days of gratitude” I’m finally releasing the expectation that gratitude somehow delivers you from one state to some other presumed “better” or improved state of being. I surrender my expectation that life should be the pursuit of some mythical “ease” and instead claim the conviction that life will be life, but I’ll choose to be grateful independent of outcome because that is the *experience* of life I desire to have. My intention is to be grateful despite the wonkiness and to hold on to that thread while offering it up to others seeking their way as well. My friend Marie McRee always says “if you’re gonna tell a story tell a good one.” And ultimately, I guess, that’s exactly what gratitude helps us do. #gratefulanyway 💗🙏✨ 365 days of gratitude...day 119 (119/365/y13) #365DaysofGratitude #GratitudeGirl #DailyGratitude #EverydayMagic #gratefulone #christmas2022 #prayersup #griefitude #chronicwellness #chronicillness #chroniclyme #longcovid #mcas #pots #ulcerativecolitis #healingjourney #themysticspath #yearofresonance #2023mysticsalmanac

Posted by lindsaypera at 2022-12-29 07:57:28 UTC