Be Grateful and Stop Complaining

We’re never sufficiently grateful for any of the day to day things we take for granted and only realize what they’re really worth to us if they’re taken away.  Or when we can vividly imagine being without them, or think there’s something infinitely better out there.

I’m so happy to be able to see, and to read, and to sit down and write.  And to have the time to indulge myself, doing the things I love to do.

I’m reading “How It All Began” by Penelope Lively, and came across this quotable bit that reminded me of my mom.

“She is as much a product of what she has read as in the way in which she has lived;  she is like millions of others built by books, for whom books are an essential foodstuff, who could starve without.”

When mom lost her ability to read because of macular degeneration, I imagine there must have been a period of time when she was quite devestated by it all.  For her, reading was like breathing, and thus rather a hard thing to give up.  But she discovered audio books, and embraced the whole concept of books on tapes and cd’s and never looked back.  She still struggled with a big lighted magnifying glass to read the paper and look at photos with her peripheral vision.  But she hardly ever complained.  She was grateful that she wasn’t completely blind.

It took a really long time, but I finally figured out what she meant when she told us to be grateful and stop complaining.  We waste so much time and energy whining about inconsequential crap when we should be happily enjoying the life we’ve been given.

The book’s theme isn’t gratitude, it’s all about cause and effect, and how one simple event causes a domino reaction of situations and life changes in the lives of people that you would never suspect the original event might influence.

So go with the flow, is my point I suppose.  Don’t sweat the small stuff.  Roll with the punches.  Be happy when you’re punched that you’re still able to roll.