For Thanks and Giving
As the week of Thanksgiving progresses, I feel overwhelmed by the sense of gratitude and humility palpating in the air. In spite of the festival not touching me in major ways except an extended weekend and opportunities to whet my appetite for shopping through astronomical sales, it does bring home the fact that the last time I felt thankful for this life was a few light years back.
In fact at the risk of sounding clichéd and iterative, the spirit of the season is almost forcing these words out on paper – thanks and giving.
If there ever is logged a list of occurrences, people and possessions an individual can possibly be thankful for, it would effortlessly run into reams of pages. But the times we take for granted most basic things, in the absence of which life would be extremely “frictionful”, are plenty. To impress upon this, my fitness instructor made our group go through an interesting exercise. We worked out for almost an hour as if we had knee injuries on both knees and were constricted in a straight leg position by knee braces. Simple things like getting up from the floor, lifting our legs up, required humungous efforts of mind and body. This provides us an opportunity to be thankful for a body that is healthy and supports us continually. The fact that in spite of those knee braces we could manage to work out other parts of the body implies a need to be thankful for a sound mind that somehow overcomes most of the restrictions for a normal living.
Looking through a different angle, there is another orphaned facet of being that we conveniently ignore- to be thankful for not so delectable happenings in life – places and positions of mental and physical discomfort. Definitely on hindsight everyone can procure a list of instances where the occurrence seemed like the dawn of a huge misfortune but the passage and thereafter is actually a blessing that masqueraded as a disaster – whether it be a lost opportunity eventually leading you to a better situation, a broken relationship taking you to a more fulfilling partnership or a difficult effort metamorphosing into a smooth ride further. All it takes is to never loose the faith and be thankful even for your misgivings because the caterpillar will subsequently turn into a butterfly.
This car bumper sticker that I came across sums it all:
“I am an atheist, thank God!”
As the week of Thanksgiving progresses, I feel overwhelmed by the sense of gratitude and humility palpating in the air. In spite of the festival not touching me in major ways except an extended weekend and opportunities to whet my appetite for shopping through astronomical sales, it does bring home the fact that the last time I felt thankful for this life was a few light years back.
In fact at the risk of sounding clichéd and iterative, the spirit of the season is almost forcing these words out on paper – thanks and giving.
If there ever is logged a list of occurrences, people and possessions an individual can possibly be thankful for, it would effortlessly run into reams of pages. But the times we take for granted most basic things, in the absence of which life would be extremely “frictionful”, are plenty. To impress upon this, my fitness instructor made our group go through an interesting exercise. We worked out for almost an hour as if we had knee injuries on both knees and were constricted in a straight leg position by knee braces. Simple things like getting up from the floor, lifting our legs up, required humungous efforts of mind and body. This provides us an opportunity to be thankful for a body that is healthy and supports us continually. The fact that in spite of those knee braces we could manage to work out other parts of the body implies a need to be thankful for a sound mind that somehow overcomes most of the restrictions for a normal living.
Looking through a different angle, there is another orphaned facet of being that we conveniently ignore- to be thankful for not so delectable happenings in life – places and positions of mental and physical discomfort. Definitely on hindsight everyone can procure a list of instances where the occurrence seemed like the dawn of a huge misfortune but the passage and thereafter is actually a blessing that masqueraded as a disaster – whether it be a lost opportunity eventually leading you to a better situation, a broken relationship taking you to a more fulfilling partnership or a difficult effort metamorphosing into a smooth ride further. All it takes is to never loose the faith and be thankful even for your misgivings because the caterpillar will subsequently turn into a butterfly.
This car bumper sticker that I came across sums it all:
“I am an atheist, thank God!”
posted by Garima at 2:24 PM
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