Gratitude

Video of Meeting [9 min intro, 18 min meditation, 40 min Q&A]

In the video, Gratitude, David Steindl-Rast says:

It is not happiness that makes us grateful.
It is gratefulness that makes us happy.

Alan Cohen, author of Enough Already: The Power of Radical Contentment, said:

Gratitude, like faith, is a muscle. The more you use it, the stronger it grows, and the more power you have to use it on your behalf. If you do not practice gratefulness, it's benefaction will go unnoticed, and your capacity to draw on its gifts will be diminished. To be grateful is to find blessings in everything. This is the most powerful attitude to adopt, for there are blessings in everything.

How My Son Ruined My Life is a 7-minute video which shows James Baraz's 91 year-old mother talking about how seven simple words transformed her life at age 89 (see 4:57 of the video). I had the chance to talk with James a few years ago and I told him that his mother seemed really delightful to me, had she really been that much of a complainer? He said, yes, she complained constantly, but that after his stay with her when she was 89, the difference in her was so striking that his sister asked him shortly after, "What did you do to Mom?!?" She died two years after the video was made, and the day before she passed, blind and nearly totally deaf, she said "I feel so lucky. Lucky to have you all here, lucky to have had the life I've had."

Videos and Readings for this module

Gratitude - David Steindl-Rast [5 min]
How My Son Ruined My Life - Selma & James Baraz [7 min]
Kurt Vonnegut story about "enough" - Richard Kind [44 sec]

Supplementary Resources

The Terribly, Tragically Sad Man - story by Loren Seibold
The 365 Grateful Project - Hailey Bartholomew [12 min]
Enough Already: The Power of Radical Contentment - book by Alan Cohen
Thanks - How Practicing Gratitude Can Make You Happier - book by Robert Emmons

Excerpts related to this topic

In the entire history of the universe, let alone in your own history, there has never been another [day] just like [today] and there will never be another just like it again. It is the point to which all your yesterdays have been leading ... It is the point from which all your tomorrows will proceed ... If you were aware of how precious it is, you could hardly live through it. Unless you are aware of how precious it is, you can hardly be said to be living at all.

- from Beyond Words by Frederick Buechner

Gratitude is not a passive response to something we have been given, gratitude arises from paying attention, from being awake in the presence of everything that lives within and without us. Gratitude is . . . the deep a priori state of attention that shows we understand and are equal to the gifted nature of life.

- from Consolations by David Whyte

Gratitude is a gracious acknowledgment of all that sustains us, a bow to our blessings, great and small. Buddhist monks begin each day with chants of gratitude for the blessings of their lives. In the same way, Native American elders begin each ceremony with grateful prayers to Mother Earth and Father Sky, to the four directions, to the animal, plant, and mineral brothers and sisters who share our earth and support our life.

Gratitude does not envy or compare. Gratitude is not dependent on what you have. It depends on your heart. You can even find gratitude for your measure of sorrows, the hand you’ve been dealt. There is mystery surrounding even your difficulties and suffering. Sometimes it’s through the hardest things that your heart learns its most important lessons.

As gratitude grows it gives rise to joy. We experience the courage to rejoice in our own good fortune and in the good fortune of others. In joy, we are not afraid of pleasure. We do not mistakenly believe it is disloyal to the suffering of the world to honor the happiness we have been given. Joy gladdens the heart. We can be joyful for people we love, for moments of goodness, for sunlight and trees, and for the very breath within our lungs. Like an innocent child, we can rejoice in life itself, in being alive.

Encounter every new moment with wonder and gratitude, and you’ll experience that it’s never too late to open your mind and your heart. As Bob Dylan sings, “He who’s not being born is busy dying.” Live fully and freely.

- from Gratitude and Wonder by Jack Kornfield

If gratitude is a state of being that is essential to a life well lived, why then, in modern times, do we not cultivate and express it on a daily basis? After all, giving thanks and expressing appreciation for the blessings and gifts of life is a natural human response. Perhaps the key reason we do not make gratitude a part of our daily lives is that the accelerated pace and multiple distractions of modern life have simply made it all too easy to forget gratitude’s importance…

...Every language in the world has a way of saying “thank you.” This is because gratitude is an inherent quality that resides within each human being, and is triggered and expressed spontaneously in a variety of different contexts. Gratitude crosses all boundaries—creed, age, vocation, gender, and nation—and is emphasized by all the great religious traditions.

- from Living in Gratitude by Angeles Arrien