2020 flew by so fast. It feels like yesterday it was announced to the whole world is in pandemic. We all spent majority of our time cooped inside our house. Then suddenly we are all preparing for Christmas, then about to welcome New Year. Because of everything that’s happening this year, it’s easy to just focus on the bad things and wallow on our own misery about not feeling the Christmas spirit. Me included. And forget the things we have to be grateful for such as simply making it today and being alive. I came across an article and would like to share it with you as well. Hope you’ll learn something and get the spirit of Christmas going.
Give from your heart, practice gratitude, hang on to hope.
My dear friend Ann says,
An “Old Fashioned” Christmas is about connecting to our loved ones. Aren’t we fortunate that we can text, call, or email? Or Zoom or Face Time! We aren’t pining away for a letter, we can connect instantly. We should be grateful. None of us ‘needs’ any more stuff. We should donate to the people in our communities who are facing hardship, and we should be grateful that we have food in the pantry and a solid house for shelter.
Kevin Beebe, a friend and Lutheran minister, says,
Gratitude leads us to pause and search the horizons of hope for one moment to give thanks for the hope we’ve already found. It grants us a moment of rest in the never-ending journey of hope—for God and/or for an end to the pandemic. Gratitude is a rock cairn on the road.
Each time we pause to build it, we rest and give thanks and mark a moment in which hope became reality. We can look back on the cairns of gratitude from before and find strength to keep going, keep seeking hope.
Gratitude teaches us to see hope, not just in the future, but unfolding around us in the present. It trains us to see love and hope as real, tangible things. Without hope, we perish. Without gratitude, we will be unable to find hope.
I, Capricious 