Last week’s Saturday Gratitude didn’t happen due to the fact that I had finally surrendered to sickness (see #2, below). But today, we’re back! Here are three things I’m truly grateful for this week. Play along with me if you’re so inclined.
1) Clarity.
I’ve been struggling for a long time with some issues that just wouldn’t seem to budge, no matter what I did, no matter how hard I tried to push through them. Once again, I had to come to the realization that pushing through does not always work. In fact, when I’m dealing with a complex tangle of stuff, it almost never does. I had to reach a place of acceptance — at a deep level — and now that I have, clarity is starting to peek through the clouds. Yay for clarity!
2) Health (and self-acceptance!).
Well, relative health — I’m almost feeling like me again. For eight days, I struggled with a bad cold and really could not function in a normal way. Of course — as tends to be my way — I fought the fact that I was sick for about four days and tried to function normally anyway. As above, I defaulted to trying to push through when, in the long run, it would have made things easier and simpler to accept that I was sick and give myself the rest I needed. But it took me four days to get to that place. Letting go does not come easily or automatically for me, even after twenty years of practicing. So, here’s where self-acceptance sweeps in to save the day.
3) Weather and walking!
Today, it feels like winter in Chicago again, but yesterday — oh! For the first time in ages, I was able to take a long walk in the sunshine and enough treacherous ice had melted off that I wasn’t slipping all over the place. I could even feel the onset of spring, and the birds and squirrels chattered wildly everywhere I went.
And I reconnected with how incredibly valuable — vital, even — it is to get out and be in nature. Walking outside solves my problems. Really, it does. Or maybe the more accurate way to put it is, it shows me that what I thought was a problem is actually not a problem. I just get so stuck in looking at it a certain way that I believe it’s a problem.
Walking, connection with the earth beneath my feet, shakes up the stuck. So, gratitude, too, for being healthy enough to walk, to move; for being able to hear the sounds of the birds and squirrels; for the ability to see the sun glinting on the melting snow, the dog trotting by, the smile on the face of the woman walking it.
What are you grateful for this week? I’d love it if you’d share.
Image is “Frozen Sun,” © Sebastian Corneanu | Dreamstime Stock Photos
the artist's nest 
I love your gratitude posts, Jill. I, too, am grateful for the barest whispers of spring beginning to be heard — the birds in the morning especially. I never realize how much I’ve missed them until I hear their early morning chirps again. So glad you are feeling so much better, too!
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I love the sounds of birds, too, Mary, especially hearing them again after an extremely cold winter. And here we have very noisy squirrels as well — they sound more aggressive and impatient than the birds! Thanks so much for sharing. 🙂
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Another interesting blog, Jill. 🙂
It surprises me sometimes that clarity will come to me through a channel that I wouldn’t expect it to come through.
The other night I was listening to a podcast about a TV reality show. The host of the podcast made a comment about one of the contestants that gave me insight into a notion about myself that I had internalized. Clarity can come to us in ways that we would never expect, if we pay attention.
Jill, I hear you about being sick. I hope you are feeling better now. Also, about walking outside. Our summers aren’t that long. The ice and snow in the winter months make walking outside difficult for me, so I am indoors a lot. There is something about walking in nature that really helps me see things in a different light.
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Marie, that’s such a great point about clarity arriving in unexpected ways. I have definitely experienced that, too, and I love your reminder of it! There’s much to be said for being open to it, however it arrives. 🙂
And thanks, I’m feeling quite a bit better — in fact, I just returned from a walk! Can’t wait to spend more time outside as the weather improves … Thanks so much for stopping by, Marie!
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I like #3. Walking outside always works for me.
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Walking outside really is amazing. Sometimes I think of it as my “walking meditation.” Thanks for commenting, Jim!
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