So, what are you thankful for?
Just warming you up before Aunt Nancy asks you in front of everyone at the Thanksgiving dinner table. You need to have an answer ready, and it better be good. You won’t get a grade on it or anything, but you don’t want to say, “turkey,” and watch everyone struggle to laugh.
Having a good answer to “What are you thankful for?” was only a Thanksgiving Day phenomenon until 2003, when I had a life-changing conversation. I was on the phone with a friend/mentor, deeply troubled by some drama occurring in my life at the time. It was earth-shattering, although I have no recollection of what it was, probably some bonehead I was dating at the time.
My friend, Mo, listened patiently for a few minutes while I droned on about whatever it was. Then she cleared her throat loudly.
“Do you ever write gratitude lists?”
I remember wondering if she was seriously interrupting my whining session with a possible journaling exercise.
“No. I haven’t,” I answered abruptly.
“You know, when something is really bothering me, I try to think of three things I am grateful for, and it makes whatever I was worrying about seem really small,” she replied.
“I have to get back to work now. Think about a gratitude list.”
The list was full of simple things, things that really matter
After we hung up, I was feeling defensive. I wondered if she was trying to say that I was ungrateful. I was grateful for plenty of things. Determined to show Mo, I quickly wrote down three things.
I sat there waiting for my problems to go away. They didn’t. I looked back at the list and read what I had written: my dogs, food in my fridge, my life. Suddenly, more things came to me. I kept writing until I had maybe 20 things on my list. I really did have a lot to be grateful for. I smiled, tears rolling down my cheeks.
The list was full of simple things, things that really matter. I felt joyful. I called Mo back, expecting an “atta girl.” She simply told me to start writing a list of at least three things every morning and calling her to tell her what they were. The trick was that I couldn’t write the same things every day.
I was annoyed, but Mo was happy, so I figured she might know something I didn’t. I started making daily lists, no matter what was happening in my life. Something happened. My problems did not go away, but I seemed able to cope with them better than I had before.
Since then, I’ve had brief intervals when I skipped the list, but I always regret it. There is something about stopping and taking stock of everything you have that makes you forget what you do not have.
November is a month steeped in gratitude. It is Gratitude Month, after all, but a month of gratitude is not enough. I have found the secret to joy is finding gratitude every day. There is always something. I have always heard that whatever you focus on becomes larger. That is the way gratitude works. The more reasons I see to be grateful, the more reasons I see to be grateful.
An Emmy-nominated anchor/meteorologist/reporter at FOX66 and NBC25, Leslie Toldo recently retired from TV news after a career of over 30 years, nearly 20 in Flint. She is a blogger, writer, wedding and funeral officiant. Born and raised in Baton Rouge, LA, she graduated from the University of Wyoming. An avid kayaker, boater and runner, Leslie lives in Linden with her husband, Ellie the cat and three dogs: Henry, Gus and Lucy.
