We all know what we’re supposed to feel…
Gratitude!
Have you ever been in a place where that felt completely impossible? Have you ever felt like everyone is receiving blessings except for you?
About 7 years ago, when everyone else was celebrating the holidays…
my husband was in a huge hospital in New York City for what turned out to be three weeks. He’d just been through months of intensive chemotherapy and was about to face months and months more.
Every afternoon I’d go and visit him, by myself, as children were not allowed in that wing of the hospital, so my kids were at home with my mom, and he felt too weak to have friends drop by.
And every night after leaving his room, I’d walk down the sidewalk to the subway entrance, my puffs of breath freezing in little clouds in front of me as I sobbed. Sometimes I bought a package of M&Ms from the newsstand on the corner and popped them into my mouth one at a time instead of crying.
I did NOT feel grateful!
I felt by turns scared, exhausted, hopeful, and despairing. Mostly I just felt alone.
I prayed a lot as I walked down that familiar sidewalk. I listed things I should be grateful for: my mom, my kids, the nice nurses, my friends. I didn’t feel grateful.
Some nights I went on Facebook on my phone to distract myself, and saw photos of my friends’ parties and cruises and kids and dinners. I felt jealous and confused and nauseous and a lot of things… but not one of them grateful.
Then one night I looked up. And there was the moon. It was a full, round, dappled white moon.
The moon just was
The moon I’d seen as a teenager as I walked my black Labrador every night. The moon I’d pointed out to my daughters, rising huge and orange on the horizon on a vacation in Italy.
The moon was glowing in the sky like nothing strange was happening at all, like my husband wasn’t in mortal danger, like my kids weren’t about to possibly be raised by a terrified and hysterical single mother who only stopped crying when she was actively eating chocolate.
Wonder pushed out the other emotions
And still, on that frigid January night, standing alone on the sidewalk with a forgotten package of M&M’s clutched in one ungloved hand, I didn’t feel grateful. But I did feel wonder.
And the wonder immediately and effortlessly pushed out the other emotions. My mind, for the first time in months, cleared and stilled. All thoughts and worries and terrors and criticisms were smoothed away like that giant Zamboni truck ice-paves over ruts on a skating rink.
I looked up at the moon and felt wonder.
Holiday blues?
Then I kept walking to the A train, calm, feeling old gray snow mush under my feet and frosty air plunge from my nose to my lungs. And I felt sort of, weirdly, what was the word for it again? …happy.
My husband, almost miraculously, slowly and completely recovered. We knew how we should have felt: grateful. But we were still too shaken and tired and worried most days.
But I’d found a workaround: wonder.
If you’re not having a Happy Thanksgiving and you’re pretty sure a Merry Christmas is not in store for you, try wonder.
Wonder is that feeling you get when your mind stops chattering for a few precious seconds, and pure awareness seeps through your body. Wonder is almost always low-key surprising – not shocking, just something that pops up on you, like a baby’s uproarious laugh in a quiet waiting room or sunlight slicing through tree branches and throwing black and white art on the cement below.
Wonder is not something you make happen; it’s something that happens to you. It’s something you hope for.
But the more you ask the Universe for wonder, the more you open up to the merest possibility of wonder, the more moments of wonder you’ll find every day. You’ll see. You’ll wire your brain for wonder.
And wonder leads, my friends, to joy.
If you are in a season of your life where you can find gratitude, that is beautiful. Gratitude grows happiness and abundance.
If you are in a more challenging season, I wish you wonder.
If you want a little guidance on this journey, you can schedule that here. Because I’ve been there, and I can help you find strength, hope, calm, and joy.
Happy Overgiving! Wait…
That’s supposed to be Thanksgiving, right? If you’re like many women, you’re overgiving in November and December. And overgiving sucks.
Overgiving leads to burnout, which you probably knew. Did you know overgiving also can lead to resentment, anger, misunderstanding, and entitlement?
Yeah.
Email me at tara@beyondyourbelief.com for a copy the recording of my December 2024 Masterclass – Reclaim Your Power: Better Boundaries, Better Life. If you feel taken advantage of in personal relationships, overlooked at work, or overwhelmed with life in general, you have a boundary issue. It may seem to you like life is just this way: people are super needy and a little mean, the world is exhausting. But life does not have to be that way. When you have strong boundaries, your inner world changes. And when your inner world changes, your outer world changes.
I’ve got you and can help you change those boundaries.