Safe Haven

A series of events like getting shingles half a year ago to seeing a scribbled poem I wrote last month on the train home describing how I feel lighter and more hopeful–to cleaning my bed shelves and reading old birthday and holiday cards three days ago – allowed me to come up with this quick blog post topic: gratitude.

Holidays aren’t the jolliest or easiest of times for everyone. For some, it can be about Christmas lights, huge family get-togethers, gifts and shopping, while for others, it may include anxiety, depression, loss, and stress. We can get caught up with certain circumstances and forget to think, reflect and be thankful for all that we do have, which isn’t always guaranteed. Despite broken relationships, unfulfilled dreams and longings, and turbulent situations, gratitude comes in and has the ability to change the perspective through which we view these happenings.

I believe I am a positive, appreciative person most of the time, however, I do get caught up with life and sometimes catch myself complaining about something (a lot more this past year than ever). “I’m so tired, I didn’t get enough sleep”, “My room is such a mess…”, “I want to take off and go on a trip”, “I’m so busy and have talked all eight hours at work”. What I forget is that it is exactly in those moments that I need to take time to be extra grateful for all my blessings. I’m alive. And every second I am alive, I have the ability to change and morph into someone better and do better. There are opportunities out there waiting for me to take, if I am willing. And so for the remainder of 2017 and coming 2018, I am striving to complain no more.

In times when I’m feeling distressed, swamped, tiny, sorrowful, exhausted, or distraught, I am reminding myself that I am extremely grateful for all that I have right here and now. My health, supportive and giving parents, selfless and loving sister, an amiable and understanding partner, encouraging readers and believers of my blog and it’s future to come and wonderful friends who still want to hang out with me when I have bailed 10 times over.

I really couldn’t ask for more.

Gratitude isn’t always the easiest to be conscious of when so many other thoughts occupy the mind, but it truly transforms the way we interact with our relationships. Gratitude itself is a mindset and an outlook. It is an attitude, and attitudes are the center of our lives. Treat yourself with kindness and love that you treat your loved ones and spread that to the rest of the universe. Being grateful leads to a tremendous amount of great things. Great things take time. But that’s just with anything, including time itself.

I’ve realized that life becomes brighter when I expect nothing and view life as a gift filled with opportunities. Gratitude changes everything.