Gratitude
Gratitude’s often harder than it sounds. It’s a lot easier to want more than to be happy with what you have, especially with the media being how it is. You can watch one short TV program (or even the news) and be bombarded with what you haven’t bought, with what you haven’t eaten, with what you haven’t experienced. How can you be satisfied with that computer when this computer is better and faster? How can you be satisfied with that game when there’s a new one out? There are endless movies to see and fast food to buy and nothing you have will ever be enough, because there’s always more. You could have billions of dollars and remain unsatisfied.
What about things that don’t require money? What about a peaceful life, or good grades, or friends? How can anyone be grateful when their mother dies? Or if everyone rejects them at school and their grades aren’t much, even if they study very hard . . . and so forth.
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Gratitude is often difficult, but it’s never so difficult as when life seems to be going badly. Yet, something always exists to be thankful for—innumerable things exist to be thankful for. But it takes creativity, effort, and will to list thankfulness for sky and birds and life and that extra nickel and that kind word when such things are tiny blips of light in darkness. To put forth that kind of effort, though, helps you appreciate more what you have, even in the midst of anguish, and can help you find hope to continue. You may have lost, but you have a great deal still, and God is always and ever there for you. |
This is one reason why Mormons make a point of having a section in their prayers devoted to gratitude. Gratitude comes before the part of a prayer devoted to asking God for aid. Before aid is asked, after all, it’s appropriate to acknowledge all the aid that has been given. Beyond that, it really does help us realize that our lives are full of miracles, small ones, quiet changes of mood and conversation that end up benefiting us later. In Mormon belief, God has a personal hand in each of our lives.
At all times, give thanks unto God, not only in your prayers and thoughts, but in the way you live as well. Gratitude toward God can translate into your every actions. When you are thankful for what He has given you, for your life and for your talents and your family, you live better. You want to live better. Happiness and gratitude translates into kindness to others and a desire to give others what you have, generosity and love.
Grateful people, you might think, actually, are less likely to be grasping of what they have, to be resentful of what they don’t. A grateful person is more likely to act out of a realization that others have needs that need to be met. In gratitude, we may especially not want to see someone else suffer because they don’t have enough—which isn’t to say that they don’t have everything they want. Gratitude helps us separate between needs and wants, between the essentials and the whims of the now. We might want a candy bar right now (and oh do we), but it isn’t what we need. When we are grateful for having healthy food, we might be able to step back from impulses and ask ourselves “Do I actually need a candy bar or am I better off just eating that sandwich and apple?” Wants look less attractive when we realize we have enough.
So (and the Mormon religion makes a point of this) we help the poor, we talk to the upset, we look out for ways to serve, we look for those needs to be met. When you become an adult and have children, this may become even more important.