Scarcity has dominated my mood. No one is good enough. Things not are said right enough. Expectations are not being met. All I see is what I don’t like, what is not working, what I wish were different. I am hitting the most common, my most utilized weapons of scarcity – resistance, complaining, frustration, what ifs, fear.

When my daughter and I did our “gratefuls” for bedtime, I thought to myself, “There is nothing I feel grateful for.” But commitment is strong here, to model for my child what a grateful can do for the mind, for the senses, so I searched and found the smallest things I could be grateful for. The food we had for lunch. The safe drive back and forth to a distant place we visited that day. Our home without any leaks. Together we turned our somewhat grating day into a day of gratitude. A four year old, this four year old, has tells her gratefuls like glads. “I’m glad for this doll.” “I’m glad I had ice cream for dinner.”

Gratefuls are glads.

The next day I woke up and while eating breakfast I looked around our kitchen. We were playing the radio and some good classic rock came on. Maxine took turns eating bites of french toast with getting up to dance and practice her turns, leg up. I actually felt the gratitude that her body was so strong, so agile, so healthy. I felt my heart move, and my eyes lifted to look around our kitchen, our small, galley kitchen that on any other day I see all there is to complain about, how small, too little counter space, cabinet space. In that moment, though, I felt my taste buds blossom knowing I can dictate what I eat at any time. That our house is full of food, of flavor, of nutrition. That there was food flowing out of every corner, a working refrigerator, stove, dishwasher. Is that not enough?

In that moment I felt so blessed, grateful, and my mood shifted. I remembered a broader context of a world where half of the population experiences not enough food, or must spend their entire day working to eat to live. It was a miracle that I didn’t move over into shame. How easy it would have been to slip past enough into too much, into feeling badly that we have more than enough to survive, way more, and so much choice. And for that, too, I am grateful. In these moments, I recognize that all roads leading to sufficiency are laid with gratitude.

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