Of Blessings and of Thanks

I have.

I am not alone.  

I will pass it on.

You have.

You are not alone.

You will pass it on.  

We have.

We are not alone.

We will pass it on.

When we feel “small” and act “small”, we often are reacting from a place of “deficit” and lack.  We are caught up in a moment (maybe long moment) of there’s not enough.  We often make not-do-good decisions to fill the void.  We fill it with a new thing.  A new toy.  A new purse.  A new car.  When the deficit is intangible, we fill it with movies, device scrolling, news collecting.  We fill it with food and drink.  We fill our lives with more work to make more money…

We fill the deficit with stuff and nothingness.  

This feeling of “not enough” is expansive in scope, but narrow in its consequences.  

If we don’t think we have enough, we don’t share.  We keep our money, our food, and our stuff.  If we don’t think we have enough, we don’t share.  We hoard our time and energy.  

We often feel we don’t have enough, even as we’re trying to get rid of the closets full of clothes and the attics full of stuff.  It’s often not rational.  

There might not be enough room “at the club”.  We’re not a part of the group or the “clique”.  This idea that if someone is “in”, someone else is “out”.  This idea that love and friendship is finite.  There’s not enough to go around.

Here’s a Secret: Love is infinite.  I’m getting ahead of myself, but this is important.  Love is Infinite.  Loving one person doesn’t lessen the love for someone else.  God’s love for one person doesn’t lessen God’s love for someone else.  We know this, but we sometimes don’t act on this.  We’re carrying habits from long ago into now. God’s love is infinite.  God loves us…enough.  The more God loves, the more love there is.  The more WE love, the more love there is to share.  Love creates more love.  

It’s true.  Notice the people who seem most loving…they don’t just love a few, a small, a little circle. That love is expansive.  There’s plenty of love to go around and a certainty that there is no end to love.  That the more they offer, the more they receive.  

We have so much to offer.  We sometimes get stuck in thinking we’re not enough.  We compare ourselves to others and “fall short”.  Ever notice we compare ourselves to people living completely different lives than us (that’s everyone, by the way) and notice how they are so much: better, faster, smarter, richer, luckier…PAUSE Than us.  

They have: more time, more patience, more grace, more blessings, more joy, more…PAUSE Than us.  

We feel small and it leads us to act small.  We try to catch up to what’s not really ours.  And often, if we looked closer, we probably don’t want it.  We try to compete with one another.  To be better than…We should always be trying to “do better”, but our “better”…not the “perfection” across the street or on the TV.  

“Small”.  It’s not that our small acts and small gifts don’t matter.  We’re all creating ripples that become greater and greater, especially with that intention and love we talked about in the Kids Moment.  This “small” is the small that constricts us and narrows us.  Small as is fear small.  That limits us and limits our giving and limit our actions in the world. The small that keeps us in fear and away from being the best version of ourselves and doing to work we are called to do.  Yes, God is calling us.  Listen.  It’s the fear and small, that keeps us from being honest with ourselves and with God.  

We’ve all had these moments.  We’ve all gotten lost and stuck in them in different ways and in different times.  Sometimes, we don’t even realize we’re caught up in them.  It’s when we pause (take the rest note and breathe) that we can know it’s time for change and possibility.  We can choose to stay in our old habits or listen to the call and notice that we’re feeling constricted.  This isn’t how we’re meant to be in this world.  PAUSE 

A small shift can help.  Thursday was National Gratitude Day.  You may notice that there are quite a few “remember to be grateful” posts appearing on our social pages.  That’s because sitting in gratitude is SO important.  Then…moving forward from gratitude.  

Watch:

One.  Gratitude is More-ness.  It pulls us from the shrink wrap of “deficit”, “not enough”, “the void” into More.  There IS enough and enough creates MORE enough.  In gratitude, we see clearly what we do have. There are blessings in the “ugly”. There is sweet in the bitter.  In the pause to Gratitude, we discover there is usually more sweet than we realize.  We discover that Love is Infinite.  Pausing in gratitude shifts the way we see the world.  We see it full of Blessing.  We see it with God’s Love.  It cultivates deep heart-courage and compassion.  It may act small, but its ripples are huge.  Gratitude pulls us out of the sticky mud of Not Enough to a clear heart and mind for God.  

Two.  Gratitude carries us to Thank You!!!  Not only do we notice that we are blessed.  I am blessed.  Me. I am.  Thank you carries us to more than me!!  It carries us into We.  Thank you God for these blessings. Thank you neighbor for this service. Thank you friend for your love. Thank you.  Thank you.  Thank you connects us to others.  Those who make up the infinite blessings of our lives.  In this world with a “loneliness epidemic” thank you leads us to solace.  We open up to abundance.  The shallows deepen.  The muds clears.  The smalls becomes expansive.  Enough becomes infinite.  Fear becomes Love.  

Blessings and Thank You are the greatest of Prayers.  

It doesn’t end there.  

Three.  We “pay it forward”.  We pass it on.  We do the work.  We share blessings.  We share thank you’s.  We do the work to create more abundance, not just for ourselves, but for everyone.  We do the work to create connection, not just where it’s easy, but for everyone.  We practice intentional service from a place of blessings and thank you.  From a place not of less but of infinite more.  We serve from a solid anchor of Infinite Love and knowing that love through Gratitude and Thank You.  

This is good.  Keep it going:

We are blessed. Gratitude.

We are not alone.  Thank you.  

Pass it on.  You are blessed and you are not alone.