Dear Ones, 

I’m thinking this month about how practices of gratitude are different from a feeling of gratitude – because the theme is Nurturing Gratitude.  I know that gratitude arises for me when I take the time to notice and appreciate the people and beings and things around me, and so the simplest practice is that of paying attention.  And.  I think it’s one thing to notice what is around us, and it’s quite another to counteract our busyness and our worries about the state of the world, so we have the time and energy to appreciate it.  Making that space for ourselves is a practice, beyond simply paying attention. 

This means that simply allowing gratitude to arise likely isn’t enough – we have to actually prepare ourselves to be able to experience the things in our lives that can sustain us.  It’s like a garden – our busyness and worries work like weeds, suffocating and crowding out gratitude before it has a chance to sprout even the tiniest leaf.  So gratitude has to be nurtured, like the flowers or vegetables we want to grow.  It calls us to actively pay attention, like adding nutrients – and to change something within ourselves so we can pay attention, like pulling those weeds. 

So, friends, what nutrients do you have to add, and what weeds do you need to pull, to nurture gratitude in your life?

In faith and love, Karen