Cultivating Gratitude

I met my mother on the coast for our annual weekend away together. The little hotel we stayed in is run by an elder Vietnamese woman who always has a smile on her face. The evening I checked out, she overheard me whistling and grinned in admiration. "I like your whistling. You very good at it. It's important to sing, too. It cost nothing, and it make you happy," she said, nodding.

I agreed, and we touched hearts candidly around music, life, and love. I pointed to a picture of her on the wall looking much younger and well-dressed, sitting alone at a bistro table. "You look so serious here. You were then, weren't you?"

"Yes," she said. "I was younger, and my life more formal then in Vietnam. Now I live here in this beautiful place, and I can relax and be grateful. I so fortunate to live here."

"You are even more fortunate to touch that place of gratitude," I told her.

"How come you know so much?" she asked. "You only thirty-five? Most people don't know to sing or be grateful 'til they are much older. Who taught you?"

Who, indeed? A cosmic convergence, the perfect storm. I am so grateful for this gift. I walked out of her lobby, across the parking lot, and stood on the edge of a bluff overlooking the ocean. The sunset brushed orange and red behind dark clouds. I planted my feet into sandy succulents and stared across the grey stretch of sea before me.

I felt gratitude. Deep into the reaches of me, awareness of what has been gifted, my joy and appreciation for the love that courses through my days, consumed me. My gratitude sank deeper than it may ever have yet, stretched above and beyond what I thought possible. I realized that it was barreling ever outward into the infinite expanse that is me in the Universe, and I watched with wonder to realize that I will live to see this grow.

I touched my gratitude for a mother who I have come to recognize and value as the unique spirit she is in the world, the privelege of knowing her intimately through my role as daughter. I touched my gratitude for the beauty of the place I stood, always and forever caught in the cycle of chaos and order, growth and destruction. I touched gratitude for my awareness of the Beloved within me, beyond the hard but attractive notion that it belongs to the partners who have worn this collar in my life.

I sat with gratitude only for gratitude's sake and the blessed realization that this may be at the core of my life's work in growing my capacity for love.


P.S. Two hours after writing the above, I finally finished a brilliant article from The Sun magazine, January 2008, entitled "Through A Glass Darkly: Miriam Greenspan On Moving From Grief To Gratitude." Succinct and powerful insights on the process. So grateful for Greenspan's gift in being and sharing. Check it out at our local library.