Thanksgiving has a little different meaning to me this year so I thought I’d share on it. It has nothing to do with fashion, but I wanted to post it anyway -ha!
I’ve become a grump. No, I’m serious. I’m not quite sure when it happened, maybe it was after rough patches in life, but it happened. It was slow and just got progressively worse. I found myself griping over the pettiest of things. I may have not said them out loud, but I was thinking them, which might be worse. I would think things like, “Argh! Why is this person going so slow? It’s too early. It’s too late. I’m tired. My husband has all the fun. My kids wake up way too early. My kids are too loud. That lightbulb is out again, again! Why is the AC not working again? Why did she/he do that?” The monotony of everyday life would just grate on me. Yup, you see, a total grump. And I didn’t think anything of it. I just felt like I was being “real”.
Then something happened. I realized I was not a happy grump. In fact, I was becoming a victim of my own complaints and my own grumpiness. I stopped noticing all of the wonderful things and instead just started to notice all the annoyances around me. And then I thought they were only happening to me. Why just me? Well, it wasn’t just me. And thank goodness I had a friend that cared enough to help get me out of my grumpiness. The best way out of the grumps is to counteract it, so we started doing a 26 day alphabetical gratitude list. We started texting each other 3 things a day that we were thankful for that started with the corresponding letter. Here was my W day:
In that moment, I realized that because I was grateful for my boys, for their friendship with one another, their brotherhood and their health, I didn’t even worry about being woken up early and it’s possible effect on my day. My gratitude stopped my grumpiness first thing in the morning. You can change your whole day just by giving thanks first thing in the morning.
Those 26 days helped get me out of my serious grump slump, but I didn’t want to stop. I didn’t want to slip back into my grumpy ways. So we started the #100happydays challenge. We started texting each other pictures of what makes us happy. Here’s one of my happy days:
I realized in that moment that there is something powerful in being grateful for the more mundane tasks of motherhood, like serving your kiddos eggos and orange juice. You see, I don’t have many memories of my mom doing the monotony of motherhood, like making eggo waffles. She was an alcoholic doing her best to survive this world. She was doing her best (more about that here). But I get to provide my sons with the security that comes from the monotony of waffles. I get to break the cycle! You can make peace with the past by being grateful for the present.
And then I read One Thousand Gifts, and it solidified a way for me to stay out of my grump slump. The author started writing 1,000 things she was thankful for, and in the book she writes about how it transformed her life. It was a wonderful read. And one of the many things she made me realize was that I can be happy even in the monotony by practicing gratitude. So guess what I’m doing?!?!? Yup, I’m starting a 1,000 things to be thankful for list. I add to it everyday. This is how I’m starting to view life (on a good day -ha!):
And then I came across this on my Instagram feed before I left for my trip to Santa Barbara, and it made me think…
Regrammed from Jewelry Nut Auctions Instagram
I could choose to not be anxious about heading out of town without my boys and missing their weekend events. I could, instead, be grateful that my sons were able to be with other people that love them so much. I hadn’t been able to even enjoy the excitement of the trip because of my anxiety over leaving my sons, and I knew this quote was exactly what I needed to do. You can’t feel opposing emotions, therefore you can’t feel anxious if you start focusing on what you are thankful for.
ALL that to say, Thanksgiving has a very different meaning to me this year. I am giving thanks as a new way to live. Now, here’s my disclaimer: This is a practice. I’m still learning, and I’m still grumpy a lot of the time… just not ALL the time. HAHAHAHA!
Giving thanks for all of you this year. Thank you for reading, and thank you for always being so supportive. Here’s to staying out of my grump slump one Thanksgiving Day at a time!
