What’s one NEW thing you’re grateful for today?
Here’s my Day 2 of Gratitude:
Right now I’m grateful for nature. As I watch nature I observe how they all coincide in harmony with one another, yet completely individual from one another at the same time. How they blend but don’t bump heads. I watch and listen to the billowing leaves as my eyes shift to the weeds tickling in the wind. And the water flowing seemingly with its own rhythm and flow, recognizing the trees and the weeds but asserting herself anyway. A quiet rage in the increasing current, met by the surrender of the trees, and stones, and sand. The social cohesion of heated breeze from the beaming sun overhead smiling into the canal. How they flirt. How they don’t resist one another, they allow.
One influences the other. The wind influences the trees. The trees receive and adjust. It is affected but it’s not bothered. And so, I understand that there is a difference between being affected and being bothered. That being affected is inevitable. That you’re always going to be affected by something coming at you. Whether it bothers you is the variable. Nature is not bothered. It shifts, adjusts, and invariably transforms. There is so much to learn so much from nature.
Today’s lesson is surrender. The trees don’t resist the force coming in, which is the wind in this case. But it is affected. Yet somehow there is a harmonious overtone. A social cohesion.
There is a rhythm and rhyme to all of it despite the wind being so spontaneous. Nature is a constant state of alignment. Nature being out of alignment is the end of all that is. We would be stripped of everything if nature resisted us. But it’s all because nature allows. It allows what is happening to happen. And it is not bothered. It may be affected, it may transform but it ALLOWS. And because it allows it, it evolves. It allows its growth. It allows regeneration. It allows it to change in new forms. It allows the branch to fall and mold into the ground and for a new life forms to emerge therefrom. It allows the rocks and stones to form a bank with the current of the river that changes the flow, pattern, and rhythm of the water all together. Or how about when it rains, what’s more beautiful than our world is turned into an oasis where water falls from the skies. The clamor of rain and the jungle is music. The shimmer of raindrops cascading from a leaf captures so much beauty and life in one moment. Because nature allowed it.
We can’t change or necessarily influence all of the things that come at us or have come at as in our lives. But we can use it to grow and shift into new forms. We can take that spatter of paint that we thought didn’t belong and turn it to a tree, and that tree into into an enchanted forest. That inspires the galaxy of pastels to paint the sky to complement the forest on your canvas.
One informs the other. We do not grow if we don’t allow. If we don’t accept what we cannot change or have the power to change and use it to inform what we CAN go on to do and serve and create in our lives as a result. We can’t erase spatters of paint, just as the trees cannot resist the passion of the wind. But we can use what has happened to us in order to allow new forms of our soul to express itself in new mesmerizing, magnificent, captivating and creative ways. Ways you never would have though possible had you not endured what you have in your life.
There are gifts in our pain. There is much to gain from our trauma. But we have to make it though it, and know that no experience is had without something invaluable to gain from it. Without exception. It was powerfully empowering for me when I learned that my trauma wasn’t meant to be a black mark on the context of Cody’s life. That my pain, shame, and suffering was meant to be the context for which beauty and artful creations are conjured from.
If I lived life without my trauma, I would be happy. I won’t deny that. But I’m also going to accept that because of my trauma, my life is different. And beautiful in different and creative ways that I personally love and wouldn’t change if I had the chance. Because it is me. And I can’t change who I’ve grown into but I can infuse him with the wisdom of the experiences I HAVE endured, survived, and grown from.
Learning from your pain is what activates it’s powerful and transformative effects in your life, as well as the lives you encounter from it. When your pain grows, your purpose grows. And there is a greater reason why you are here for what you have gone through. Are you willing to find out what you are really capable of in this world? It may truly be the reason why you are here. You can turn a scuff mark into a work of art in the canvas of your life IF you allow it.
For those of you just seeing this post, the 21 Days of Gratitude challenge was an experiment conducted by scientists in which people were asked to find ONE NEW THING to be grateful for each day for 2 minutes a day for 21 days.
What they found was people who tested low-level pessimists were now testing low-level OPTIMISTS by the end of 21 days. And went on to radically shift their lives as a result.
Feel free to share something new you’re grateful for today in the comments!
With Love & Gratitude, Cody
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