OH YAY the grey wagtails have returned from their winter wonderlands. a flash of greeny, yellowy, grey caught a ray of sunlight over the beck at the back of our flats and there they were, a handsome couple, bob bob bobbing along. a feathery augur of spring. add to that sightings of a hover fly sucking up to the heather, bickering blackbirds, bonking pigeons a buzzing bumble bee and all i need is the bats to believe the Big Cold is over.
Can you believe we are almost a quarter of the way through the year already? it feels as though my life is dribbling away like a magical charge crackling from the finger tips of a cosmic magician prior to being hurled into the void. With winter on the wane it seems a propitious time to review January's New Year's Resolutions. Did you make any? did you keep any?
Confession time.... every year i cheat !! working on probability theory i make several on the basis that the more i have to work with the higher the chance of sticking with at least one of them. hey.... i'm honest about my duplicity
Did i keep them ??? nope... not one !!! B U T in my 30th December blog post, where those rash promises were made in the heat of good intentions, i reminisced about a Happiness Jar my sons had kept years ago. at the end of each day we decided on one good thing to be thankful for, wrote it on a slip of paper and popped it in the jar. throughout the year if things got tough, or we needed booted backsides, the jar would be tipped onto the dining table and all those positive memories read and smiled over helping to chase the darkness into the shadows. since writing about it i've heard of several people who do the same.... see my friend Juliet's classy jar in the photo above.... and it inspired me to start one for 2016
"Why go to the bother of putting pen to paper"? some ask, assuming you can FIND a pen. "all you have to do is remember the good things". but we don't, do we? It seems to be intrinsic to human nature that for every cheerful event stored in the memory vault we allow a dozen gloom and doom scenarios take precedence. for each kindness shown a mountain of slights and oversights throw their malignant shadows across the vista to poison our attitude. every successful action is subsumed in the inevitable failures life throws our way. we in the west have so much to be grateful for, yet we tend to see the storm rather than the breaking of the dawn.
Gratitude is like a muscle, if you don't use it atrophy will set in, then weakness and a disinclination to exercise at all. like all good keep fit regimes if it's to be effective, it takes hard work, dedication and single mindedness.
Taking time at the end of the day to look for a patch of brightness means that no matter how difficult life may be we have an imperative to find something infused with hope, no matter how small or insignificant. some of my offerings since December include pancakes, central heating, cats, family, chocolate, Ebay, friends, sunshine, postmen, movies, grey wagtails.
After one particular day of great pain in which even getting out of bed seemed a task only achievable to a world class super hero, my soul rebelled and cried to the closed heavens "it's been a crap day, and i hurt like hell, what have i got to be thankful for"? a still, small voice, conscience? subconscious? common sense? karma? God? spoke into my soul....
"are you going to bed hungry? cold? naked? in danger? imprisoned? persecuted? exiled? homeless? No.... and you ask why you should be thankful" ?
"Why go to the bother of putting pen to paper"? some ask, assuming you can FIND a pen. "all you have to do is remember the good things". but we don't, do we? It seems to be intrinsic to human nature that for every cheerful event stored in the memory vault we allow a dozen gloom and doom scenarios take precedence. for each kindness shown a mountain of slights and oversights throw their malignant shadows across the vista to poison our attitude. every successful action is subsumed in the inevitable failures life throws our way. we in the west have so much to be grateful for, yet we tend to see the storm rather than the breaking of the dawn.
Gratitude is like a muscle, if you don't use it atrophy will set in, then weakness and a disinclination to exercise at all. like all good keep fit regimes if it's to be effective, it takes hard work, dedication and single mindedness.
Taking time at the end of the day to look for a patch of brightness means that no matter how difficult life may be we have an imperative to find something infused with hope, no matter how small or insignificant. some of my offerings since December include pancakes, central heating, cats, family, chocolate, Ebay, friends, sunshine, postmen, movies, grey wagtails.
After one particular day of great pain in which even getting out of bed seemed a task only achievable to a world class super hero, my soul rebelled and cried to the closed heavens "it's been a crap day, and i hurt like hell, what have i got to be thankful for"? a still, small voice, conscience? subconscious? common sense? karma? God? spoke into my soul....
"are you going to bed hungry? cold? naked? in danger? imprisoned? persecuted? exiled? homeless? No.... and you ask why you should be thankful" ?
2 comments:
What a beautiful, positive post that made me smile and then smile again loads of times, and you're so right, we have a lot to be thankful for. I went for a walk after a lovely lunch with our friend Lindsey. We went to Plessey woods, it was so muddy underfoot but the birds were singing, we stood many times and just listened to a chorus of different birds, and ducks on the river, New buds on the trees, with woodpeckers chock chocking, looking for bugs. We had an amazing afternoon, the car is so muddy off our shoes but they will clean, happy day but just being there we remembered all the times we'd been before and laughed at some of the daft things we did...memories are good to smile at..see you next week to make some more, Sue xxxx
Daft? you sue sue? nooooo!! not never, not sue sue, not daft !!
Spring brings out the best in us doesn't it?
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