In the United States tomorrow afternoon or evening begins what for many is a four-day Thanksgiving holiday. The roots of this holiday, one of the biggest of the year in the States, go back to the earliest days of the settling of North America. Marked by family traditions of food, the two things that are common to most menus are roast turkey and dressing. Almost as much a part of standard Thanksgiving fare in recent years has been football on television and the onset of holiday shopping season on "Black Friday," the day when most merchants move into the "black"-- profit column -- for the year.
Other countries have holidays of gratitude, such as a similar one in October in Canada. In some countries, such as Germany's Erntedankfest, the holiday is more driven by local and regional custom. But for most, the holiday comes at the end of the harvest season, when the larders are full, and the bounty of the year is most apparent.
For at least a dozen years, maybe longer, amidst the food, football, and shopping, I have turned to a practice that reminds me of the reason for this holiday. My custom of Thanksgiving (or the day or two before) has been to have a gratitude meditation. In that meditation, I go through every single day of the year in my mind's eye and feel gratitude. A stroll through my calendar beforehand is helpful, but it is amazing how much comes to memory as I mentally stroll, day by day, through the whole year.
My gratitude meditation is something of a condensed version of the gratitude practice I wrote about earlier. (Gratitude, 9/24/13) Complaints don't exist: everything is a gift. As I go through my days one by one, I feel gratitude. A new client, an interesting piece of work, or perhaps a new friend...I feel in my body and my soul those experiences. I literally let my heart run over with joy and gratitude.
Now for most people there are three kinds of days: really good or pretty good ones, ones that we would prefer not to live through again, and nondescript days, which kind of blend together. In the 365 days that make the year, most of us have a fair distribution of all three types. The intention of the gratitude meditation is to find something to be truly grateful for each and every day.
Those days that I would prefer to not think about force me to remember that everything is a gift and to find the gift. The first cold that I'd had in over 20 years knocked me flat for almost three weeks: my over-tired body got rested, and I read a book that had been on my nightstand for weeks. The eye surgery that didn't go so well: I am so grateful that the other eye works and has learned to compensate. You get the idea.
Now, what about those unremarkable days? I think they are the very best. When I meditate on those days, they make me realize how truly blessed I am. A rainy day? I am so grateful I have an umbrella. The garbage truck that awakened me early on my day off? The sun coming up over the trees in the woods behind my apartment was spectacular.
On one of those ordinary days I received a LinkedIn message from a man in Pakistan. He'd bought a used copy of The Alchemy of Fear a decade ago from a street vendor for a penny: he said it changed his life. I was so delighted that I had tears in my eyes walking down the street, reading the message on my iPhone.
Maybe I just remember that I have a roof over my head, and I've had food in my belly every day for the year. This year, I will definitely remember how grateful I am to be writing this blog, to have had time to work on the electronic version of The Game Called Life, and for the government shutdown that made those things possible.
The gratitude meditation has never failed to transform me. One holiday when I was traveling, I did the gratitude meditation on an airplane, and I was certain I would levitate right out into the clouds. This discipline puts everything in order, and I know what is really important. As I write about it, I am so looking forward to this year's reflections. I have something else to be grateful for: I get off early tomorrow, which means I have a perfect hole in my holiday calendar to do my gratitude mediation.
For those in the United States: Happy Thanksgiving!
For others: Happy Giving Thanks!
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