GRATITUDE MONTH: DAY 30: “The most beautiful moments in life are moments when you are expressing your joy, not when you are seeking it.”― Jaggi Vasudev
This was the last new quote I had this month. There are quite a few that are old favorites and ones I use year after year that I did not write about this year, but I wanted this one.
Because just reading it makes me happy and grateful and in that special space where I feel joyful at just looking for and writing about my gratitude. It brings a feeling like no other to be sharing with myself the happiness I have in my life. This is so diametrically oppositional to Ego that it shakes me up sometimes when I am not in the most spiritual of places.
After doing this practice for all these years, I can instantly feel the shift from Ego to Spirit when I begin to enumerate my blessings and gifts. Some days it is all about the things that are going well for me, other days I am listing breathing and heartbeats and brain functioning and fingers and toes, etc. It all depends on where I am when I wake up most mornings.
I almost always list my sobriety and the fact that I get these amazing 12 steps to work with. Then there are cool things like my lovely home and my beautiful gardens and a very long term yoga practice and the spiritual principles of yoga and my cat.
Whatever I am listing, I am elated with each item added to the list…Every single time I do it! I just did a quick calculation that I have written a daily list AT LEAST 360 times for 30 years plus AT LEAST 340 times for the first 3 years + 9 months (because I was sometimes rebellious, but still loved it more than I would admit); which totals 12,160 lists. This is probably very shy of the true total because I have done 2 or 3 lists on many of those days. This is my minimum and I am good with that.
That is a LOT of joy! And there has been a whole lot more joy in my life these nearly 34 years. There have been some heart-wrenching sad days, but always gratitude. The joy is doubled and tripled when I realize the balance of gratitude versus fear and Ego.
That is a LOT of beautiful moments, also. And I am not even close to being done here. Not by a long shot. I love, love, love doing this! And I did not even count the 10 years that I have been writing this blog on Gratitude every November, nor all the lists I have posted on fb to get others engaged in the practice. This is a LOT of gratitude, and I KNOW I have barely scratched the surface. Today I am sure, there will be at least 100 things to be grateful for. What a gift this thing is!
Dolphin Hug 