GRATITUDE IN APRIL

 

I am a murmurer.  A glass half empty kind of a person.  Always some kind of complaint which has been the fuel to help me take care of the task at hand, especially the ones I didn’t want to do.  It also seems that has been a recognizable trait of mine for a long time.

A specific example of this happened several years ago when my first husband and I had been talking about pioneer experiences from our family history.  He said he wished he could have been a pioneer, citing several examples to support his statement:  the adventure of stepping into the unknown, being out in the desert free from crowds of people, solving logistical challenges in the wagon train, etc.  You get the picture. 

That all sounded like a lot of hard, hot, and thankless work to me.  Ever the realist, I said to him, “Ross, you could never have been a pioneer!  You have to have a shower every day.”  He just replied in his real-life mechanical engineering thought process way, “I would have rigged something up and made a shower!”  My exasperated reply spelled out the truth of the West.  “But there was NO water even in the best of circumstances!”  Then I continued, “Is all I know is that I could NEVER have been a pioneer!”

Then came the statement which evidenced the truth of my whole personality as a murmurer.  Ross said, “Oh, yes, you COULD have been a pioneer—if you had been able to complain every step of the way!”

Spot on!  Both of us dissolved into laughter.  That was a true proclamation and a testament as to how well he knew me. 

Not long ago I saw a table-top decoration that made me pay attention to and rethink some of the complaints with which I had peppered my daily life.  On one side of the chart framed in the shape of a house were many of the things I spent a lifetime complaining about as I went all over the place taking care of my family. On the other side of the chart were the blessings I experienced which had necessitated the responsibilities on the first list.

 

   A house to clean                          A safe place to live

   Early Wakeups                                                     Children to love

   Laundry to do                           Clothes to wear

   Dirty dishes                                                            Food to eat

  Crumbs under the table                  Family meals

   Shopping to do                                                        Money to use

                          Lots of noise                                A house full of people

Had my existence really been so hollow that I had found no satisfaction in the care of my family? No!  I had loved being a wife and mother!  But I’m sure I hadn’t sounded like it sometimes. 

 

In the April 2014 General Conference for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf gave a powerful sermon about gratitude. 

He said, “Could I suggest that we see gratitude as a disposition, a way of life that stands independent of our current situation? In other words, I’m suggesting that instead of being thankful for things, we focus on being thankful in our circumstances—whatever they may be.

The choice is ours. We can choose to limit our gratitude, based on the blessings we feel we lack. ….We can choose to be like the Mormon pioneers, who maintained a spirit of gratitude during their slow and painful trek toward the Great Salt Lake, even singing and dancing and glorying in the goodness of God. Many of us would have been inclined to withdraw, complain, and agonize about the difficulty of the journey.  (THAT would have been me!)

We can choose to be grateful, no matter what. This type of gratitude transcends whatever is happening around us. It surpasses disappointment, discouragement, and despair. It blooms just as beautifully in the icy landscape of winter as it does in the pleasant warmth of summer.”

Okay, I didn’t complain ALL of the time.  But I’m sure there were times I surely made others uncomfortable in how I expressed myself when I had many responsibilities and so little time to take care of them and everything else, too.  I didn’t do a very good job of being thankful IN my circumstances.

I know it is April and not November, yet GRATITUDE is a subject that is always relevant.  I remember when I heard this talk, I was aware that I needed to make some changes.  Perhaps I did make some.  Now I need to make some more as I hear myself murmuring a lot!

So, I have committed to quit complaining and be grateful—no matter what is going on in my life!

And I invite you to examine your own gratitude scale and see where you might need some improvement, too.  We can do this!