One of the greatest secrets to happiness and contentment is giving thanks. It is hard to say both: “thank you” and “I want.” And yet, it is so easy to glide through a day (or week) with hardly a head nod toward the Great Giver of All Things.
We hurry about like the little busy bees that we are, consuming our coffees and lattes, hardly noticing the dance of flavors as we breeze through our meals, rush, rush, rushing past beautiful music, art, and daily life. Maybe the only time we actually pause is before those meals, but could we be treating our little prayer more like a ritual or an obligation than genuine praise?
We should give thanks more. Not out of guilt. Not because of this post. Not because I told you to. But because of the things around us. The sights, the smells, the sounds, the experiences, they are overflowing with the goodness of God.
A child’s unexpected laugh, a butterfly’s fluttering wings, that catchy rhythm in the air, the crepuscular rays of light shining through the oaks on our morning commute, the cicada’s summer song that fills the humid air, the smell of fresh coffee, the silly text from a friend that gave us a real smile—it’s all around us, every day. Are we paying attention? Are we walking through life at a slow enough pace to notice? Are we giving credit where credit is due? In everything, are we giving thanks? (I Thessalonians 5:18)
Not enough. I don’t do these things nearly enough. But every now and then, I catch the bug. And it’s good. Really good. Perhaps this is why I love what G.K. Chesterton wrote about saying grace. I think it captures so well the spirit of Christian daily thanksgiving:
You say grace before meals.
All right.
But I say grace before the play and the opera,
And grace before the concert and pantomime,
And grace before I open a book,
And grace before sketching, painting,
` swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing;
And grace before I dip the pen in the ink.
I’m pretty sure we could all learn from that. When we stop to consider it, the amount of goodness around us on the average day is almost overwhelming. It’s not all sunshine and rainbows out there, but the sun does shine and there is such a thing as a rainbow.
Isn’t that amazing? Stop what you’re doing next time you see one. Really stop. Take a good look at the next rainbow you see. We know it’s a promise, but it’s also really beautiful. Stunning really. Mind-blowing if you give it enough thought. Look at the next one and give it a shot. But oh yeah, don’t forget to say thanks. It will make it even better. I promise.
Photo by Dave Hoefler on Unsplash
Moore Thinking 
It’s ironic that you posted this now. I woke up this morning (having my conversations with God and myself about ….God and life) , and I was thinking about how a lot of people tend to seek God in the “extraordinary” rather than the “ordinary”. I’ve always had a “common man” (common woman) mentality….in that I have always seen life (and myself) from what you might call a blue collar point of view. I count myself as one of the many “common” people. Maybe it was my upbringing. Maybe my outlook is due to all the tough times I’ve gone through. Maybe it’s just something that’s woven into the very structure of my being by God Himself. Sometimes being a “common” person can feel like an awful cross to bear. In a world where plastic beauty is celebrated more than natural beauty, in a world where the rich and famous are adored, in a world that seems to value the stuff that is temporary and not eternal…..as Kermit the frog said ….”It’s not easy being green “. Thankfulness is a prominent theme in the bible. Give thanks to God from Whom all blessings flow. This world has the mistaken idea that “happy people are thankful”. Nope. ” Thankful people are happy!!!! When you live life from a starting point of thankfulness in God ….that happiness isn’t based on circumstances. It’s based on a deep gratitude for God’s blessings. I think that was the point of your post. Giving thanks in the “little” things….the “ordinary “things which are really extraordinary when viewed from a thankful heart. I can’t say I’m thankful for coffee…..can’t get past the awful smell or taste lol. Coffee or tea…what’ll it be? No thanks sir, only water for me. Can we just stop a moment and give thanks for water? Life comes to a halt without it. One of my favorite shows is The Walton’s. What can I say? I appreciate “old” stuff , far more than the new. John -boy Walton wants to be a writer. This is his life’s desire. One day a writer comes to Walton’s mountain. John-boy is of course overwhelmed by this. He wants to know all about this man . I think he sees him as a hero of sorts…. everything he wants to be. John- boy feels inadequate….he feels like “all he writes about are “common ” things. Him and the man have a deep conversation. The writer admits that he was always chasing the big story. You might say, looking for the extraordinary. He tells John-boy to keep writing about what he knows …those ” ordinary” things ….his family , his life on the mountain. The writer tells John -boy that he (the writer) had missed his big story by chasing it. Now, I’m about to go out and ” do the ordinary”. Loved your post.
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Thanks Carrie, I like that flip of “happy people are thankful” into “thankful people are happy”, it is a memorable way to put it. But yes, the older I get in my faith the more I am convinced that the wisest people are the one’s most satisfied in the “ordinary” or “normal”. What you said reminds me of a section of C.S. Lewis’s book That Hideous Strength that I love: “As the desert first teaches men to love water, or as absence first reveals affection, there rose up against this background of the sour and crooked some kind of vision of the seed and the straight. Something else—something he vaguely called the “Normal”—apparently existed. He had never thought about it before. But there it was—solid, massive, with a shape of its own, almost like something you could touch, or eat, or fall in love with. It was all mixed up with Jane and fried eggs and soap and sunlight and the rooks cawing at Cure Hardy and the thought that , somewhere outside, daylight was going on at the moment… he was having his first deeply moral experience. He was choosing a side: the Normal.”
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That was beautiful…the section of the book you quoted….I was already getting tears because I’m weird…but when I got to the part about “It was all mixed up with…..” , I just lost it. Gave me something new to cry over . Not sad crying….just that” it’s all mixed up with ” kind of tears. I know what I’m saying. Even if no one else does. Thank God I understand myself….mostly. Thanks for sharing Chandler .
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