What are blessings anyway?

art by lynn

art by lynn

One of the questions in my Spiritual Connections book asks how often you find yourself being thankful for your blessings. When something horrible that I might have expected doesn’t happen, I find myself especially thankful. For example, when I have a close shave in traffic, and I come out unscathed. Or I find myself thankful when something that seems particularly nice happens to me. But I see people who are in such difficult circumstances still being thankful – circumstances of poverty or disease that I don’t think I could bear.  I am amazed at their continual appreciation of small things in life, and it is important for me to have that reminder.

Just think of the close shaves we all have each day that we are unaware of – the escapes from trouble that we don’t even see.  And even buried within the tough times are blessings we may never completely comprehend. What looks like disaster can somehow pave the way for future good for ourselves or others.

And we are alive: we taste food, we feel the softness as we touch a cat’s fur, we hear music that touches us.  All the lovely little things of each day.  Being alive, even when life is tough, has lovely moments – more of them than we can keep track of. They often go by unnoticed, like unwrapped presents. I am going to unwrap a few more today.