Gratitude

At this time of year, I've been thinking more about giving thanks for the things that we have, and being grateful for our many blessings.

I was doing some reading in a book, talking about listening to people.  It mentioned that parents with teenagers, and teenagers with parents, sometimes get ideas about the way each other are.  The parents get the idea that their teenagers are rebellious, and the teenagers get into their mind that their parents are controlling.  What happens then, is that they look for those attributes that confirm their beliefs about each other.  They see only the behavior that shows them what they already suppose to be true, even to the point of ignoring the things that disprove these ideas.

I thought about this in our relationships with our earthly parents:  Heavenly Father asks us to honor our mother and our father because it focuses us on the good things they have done, in the very least in bringing us into this world.  In some circumstances, this may be all, but most often they have done countless things to show love in the way that they best can.

I also thought about our relationship with our Heavenly Father, how He wants us to love Him and be grateful to Him.  Loving God helps and blesses us so much.  As Elder Uchtdorf has said:

No, God does not need us to love Him. But oh, how we need to love God!

For what we love determines what we seek.

What we seek determines what we think and do.

What we think and do determines who we are—and who we will become.

We are created in the image of our heavenly parents; we are God’s spirit children. Therefore, we have a vast capacity for love—it is part of our spiritual heritage. What and how we love not only defines us as individuals; it also defines us as a church. Love is the defining characteristic of a disciple of Christ (The Love of God, General Conference, Nov. 2009).

Elder Bednar showed how obeying the law of tithing gives us blessings.  He said:

The imagery of the “windows” of heaven used by Malachi is most instructive. Windows allow natural light to enter into a building. In like manner, spiritual illumination and perspective are poured out through the windows of heaven and into our lives as we honor the law of tithing.

For example, a subtle but significant blessing we receive is the spiritual gift of gratitude that enables our appreciation for what we have to constrain desires for what we want. A grateful person is rich in contentment. An ungrateful person suffers in the poverty of endless discontentment (The Windows of Heaven, General Conference, Nov. 2013).

These different ideas have made me realize how, when we are grateful, are minds become focused on the good things that are all around us, the blessings that we enjoy, the great things God has done for each of us.  Living with an "attitude of gratitude," or the spirit of gratitude which the Spirit of God, helps us find the happiness already all around us.  It helps us to focus on the positive things, the great things of life instead of the negative.  Indeed, it helps us to find gratitude for even our most difficult struggles and trials.

It is so neat to continue to ponder on how the commandments God has given us are to help us be happy, help us find peace and joy in this life and the world to come and to change into the people He would have us be.

I wanted to end with this neat Mormon Message:



Love you all, dear friends!