Are You Mindfully Aware of the Good Things in Your Life?

“Gratitude is a mindful awareness of the benefits of life.”  Max Lucado

The difference between a good life and a great one, or a bad life and a good one is usually a difference of attitude and perspective.  Every day we are bombarded by countless thoughts and images, with a very limited capacity to take it all in.  Focus becomes the gate through which perspective enters.

Our minds are designed to constantly search for danger, which translates to searching for all the negative things around us that might cause harm.  Unfortunately, the noise of the negative can be so overwhelmingly loud we grow deaf to the wonderful things in our midst.

Gratitude is the ability to turn down the noise of the negative and actually see clearly the blessings in life.  It doesn’t negate the problems, or the terrible things in the world, but it brings perspective to the here and now, and doesn’t allow the fear of future possibilities to blind us to the goodness that already exists in our current circumstances.

I am grateful for my beautiful wife, a safe home, and a day that allows me to sit and enjoy a stack of books with a cup of tea.  I am aware, and life is good.