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| Truth. |
As a teacher, I
spend a lot of time advising kids on how to do things. Things like have a good
attitude, write a good essay, be a good friend, act like the young adult they
are becoming.
Sometimes I find
it hard to take my own advice.
For instance, I
often have to remind them that the only way we develop character is
through facing obstacles and
challenges. Typically, they hate it when I say this, because no one likes to
face hard things. But I tell them that much like weight training, in which
resistance is required to build muscle, so we must face adversity to learn to
persevere.
That always makes
me think of my Uncle Stephen, who was killed in a car wreck in 2009. He was a
tremendous person, and someone with a story that touched a lot of lives, even
after his death. He was in the medical field, and worked in the cath lab doing
procedures on peoples’ hearts. He used to say that the reason why they say a
doctor owns a "medical practice" is due to the fact that they are doing
just that: they are "practicing."
YIKES!!
I feel like that
puts visiting the doctor into a whole new perspective--they are practicing,
which means they have not "arrived." They are in the process of
honing their skills and getting better with each passing day.
While I am not
sure how I feel about that as a patient, I love that analogy for life. As they
saying goes, life is a journey rather than a destination, and as we go along,
we practice things with the hope of getting better and better at them as we go.
I have been
thinking a lot about practicing gratitude, which leads to practicing
contentment. I am not that great at either, but I am getting better as I
go along.
As humans, we
spend a lot of time anticipating things: growing up, graduating, getting
married, having a baby, getting the kids through school, etc, etc.
But then when the
anticipation is over because the graduation, wedding, birth, etc happened, we
often find ourselves in a lurch, trying to adjust to the lack of anticipation we
now feel. All that energy has been focused in one place, and when that focal
point is gone, you have to find somewhere else to put it.
But what if we
could stop all that and just be present in the moment, happy and
thankful for where we are?
That would be
pretty cool.
Being grateful
helps you be present and appreciate what’s in front of you.
I have been
practicing gratitude a lot lately.
And by
practicing, I would like to stress that I have been failing at it a lot
too.
But the lesson is
meaningful, and the practice is critical.
I've spent the
last 5 days in the Pacific Northwest with my family and friends, taking part in
the celebration of a wedding. One of my dearest, most cherished friends from
childhood just walked down the aisle on Saturday, and said "I do" to
the most adorable and perfectly suited young man. It was such a blessing to be
there and celebrate with them.
The weekend was
spent with a HUGE group of people who were integral to my life as I grew up. I
got to hug and talk with and spend time around all these great people who
poured into my life as a child, and who continue to pour into my life from
afar, praying for Hubster and I regularly.
Being in my
childhood home, surrounded by all these kids I grew up with, feeling all that
love, was an emotional time. And when I first arrived, my heart was burdened
with sadness over mine and Hubster's latest fertility disappointment: the
arrival of Aunt Flo (that dirty hag) after such a promising fertility chart and the relaxing
trip to Mexico. There were a bunch of my girlfriends from back home, several of
which have just gotten married, and several of which are expecting or already have
children.
I felt like a sock without a mate, because Hubster stayed home this
trip, and sad because I had hoped to come home with triumphant news. Frustrated to still be in the "space between"; not a newlywed woman, but not a mother yet either.
But then my mom
and I bumped into a dear friend of hers at Costco, whose husband was just
killed in a motorcycle accident. We hugged and talked and marveled at how well
she's dealing with all of it. Then we walked out of Costco, and I felt such a
sense of gratitude at the fact that I am dealing with my story, and not another
story.
Then I watched my
dear friend get married, surrounded by friends and family, all the craziness of
a wedding, and her holding the hand of a man who adores the ground she walks
on. I felt a sense of gratitude for being married to Hubster, who loves me
completely and wonderfully for who I am (he said that he's glad to be the color
sock that matches my color sock), and who still looks at me (3 years in October)
with the same glow that this weekend's groom looked at his new bride.
I surveyed all
the wonderful people and remembered how they came around me and Hubster when we
got married, making the long and rather challenging trip to the middle of
nowhere to be a part of our special day.
I felt so
grateful for the way that God provides us with family, even when that family
isn't flesh and blood.
While at the
wedding, I talked to a dear friend of the family whose daughter miscarried a
baby recently. She and her husband had just announced that they were expecting,
only to have to backtrack and explain that they had lost the baby.
Hearing that
story, I was overcome again with gratitude.
Struggling to
conceive is no picnic, but I can only imagine the pain and difficulty of losing
of a child, even one that’s in the early stages of a pregnancy.
Now, lest you
begin to think I am saying all this because I have it all figured out,
let me disabuse you of that notion: my practice of gratitude was overwhelming
this weekend, but that doesn't mean that I always feel so on top of it.
I still spend
plenty of time wishing that struggling to have a baby wasn't part of my story.
I don't really want to build my character anymore, if it means dealing with
this blow each and every month. Yet wishing or wanting it to go away has not
changed it. At all.
So I am
soldiering on, and trying to keep in mind that gratitude is a great antidote to
the tough stuff that often threatens to drag me down. As Gretchin Rubin writes
in The Happiness Project: “It’s easy
to be heavy. It’s hard to be light.”
Having gratitude
is about being light. And that’s not easy to do.
But it’s worth
doing.
And it’s worth
doing because gratitude and contentment are worth having. And most things worth
having in life are a lot of work.
So we have to
practice.
Every day.
And no skipping.
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