Pre-Thanksgiving Thanks

Today, Kathleen Leslie on our staff forwarded to me a post by Michael Hyatt listing some thoughts on gratitude. In the post he made a list of things for which he is grateful. I made a list of my own as well. You can check it out below.

When it comes to gratitude, I have a long way to go. I take for granted many of the gifts I have been given and am terrible at thank you notes. It is a discipline I lack. One way though I have grown in gratitude I learned from the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola. In his daily Examen or life review, he began by looking at his previous day's experiences and thanking God for any blessings. As I have begun to do this, I have discovered so many small things in the course of the day to give thanks to God. In order to focus my attention, I need to journal about it. I jot down activities of the previous day and then I write, “Thank you, Lord, for…” when I discover something new.

Also, this list is a great help as well. I’m thinking now, I could make a list of 20 items for each area of my life – family, work, friends, resources, etc. By the way, I added one that just came to mind, making it 21.

What is on your gratitude list? Write out whatever comes to mind.

Gratitude List

1. Brought up with faith in Christ – parents and Catholic school
2. Jesus and that I know him
3. My wife Mia who loves and accepts me more than I deserve
4. Mia’s beauty
5. Max and is simplicity of heart
6. Gus and his lust for life
7. Nate and his generous heart
8. Elsa and her beauty/sweetness
9. Kepha and that he is so fun
10. My job – I get to write and be on the most important mission there is for a
living
11. Michael who believed in me and put faith in me in a way no one else had
12. Food is easily available, especially chocolate
13. The generosity of people to me especially Jay, Kathleen, Chris and Michael
14. My parents who loved me and cared about me
15. Born in the United States
16. The people at Nativity
17. The Nativity staff who works hard and yet has fun with each other
18. David and his coaching and wisdom from yesterday
19. Friendship of TJ, Chris, Jay, Kathleen, Michael
20. Beer
21. Exercise and working out