gratitude and thanksiving

In yesterday’s New York Times, Sam Sifton started the morning edition with this thought:

“Good morning. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, and odds are good that at some point during the day someone’s going to ask you what you’re thankful for.

It’s a good question to ask. People should think about gratitude more often. They should share their gratitude with others, in public, and not just on Thanksgiving. Saying it out loud is an act of grace, a gift to the people surrounding you.”

Today, Thanksgiving, is about gratitude and living with a grateful heart.

I want to share a couple of my favorite readings from this book. No religion, just food for thought on this holiday that centers around a meal and why we celebrate this day.

"Tonight we give thanks for the great gift of friendship. Thank you for the circumstances that brought us together and have bound us into the sacred bundle of life. Thank you also for the gifts of our friendship; for knowledge that comforts, for words that encourage, for insight that blesses, for all the experiences shared, for the sweet bliss of deeply knowing each other in so many ways; for history and a hope of the future, for conversation and laughter, for silence, for bearing each other's witness truly, for holding each other in our hearts with great love and tenderness."

~ Daphne Rose Kingma

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"One does not need to fast for days and meditate for hours at a time to experience the sense of sublime mystery which constantly envelopes us. All one need to do is notice intelligently, if even for a brief moment, a blossoming tree, a forest flooded with autumn colors, an infant smiling."

~ Simon Greenberg

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Thanksgiving blessings to you.

As always, many thanks and much gratitude to my friend Patricia Saxton for sharing her art and her wisdom.