Thanksgiving is thanksliving

I am a fan of TED Talks on NPR. One recent program on happiness ended with 'happiness does not make us grateful, gratitude makes us happy.”

You know me; I'm big on gratitude. I have learned that anytime I'm having a bad day it's better if I intentionally practice gratitude. Once I let go of my“poor me mindset” I am freed to find healthier responses to whatever is going om. Like not having water at the kitchen sink for three weeks! Thinking of the Syrian refugees or poor women carrying water for miles quickly put my situation into perspective. It's our selfish catastrophic thinking that turns difficulty and pain into disabling unhappiness and fear of the future. While gratitude can't change what's happened it can infuse glimmers of light into the current darkness.

I find this gratitude stuff interesting because I am a natural skeptic. My tendency is to question and doubt. That's why I've taught myself to look for positives, to count my blessings. I'm deliberately rejecting the cup half empty approach to life.    Like Porgy, in Gershwin's Porgy and Bess, I remind myself that “I have plenty of nothing and nothing is plenty for me.” Even on the worst days of my life, as when my Dad died in an auto accident or one of our kids ran away, I was reminded by the kindness of friends that there's always more positives than negatives in my life.

We all spend too much energy lusting for things we don't have rather than being grateful for what we do have. Our economy is based on conspicuous consumption so we've allowed ourselves to be brainwashed into believing stuff makes for meaning and happiness, but there's a vast difference between needs and wants. In the end we have so much we don't need that we can't appreciate what we do have.

I am grateful that I grew up believing people are more important than things, that it is in doing for others I find meaning and purpose in life. I've learned that what is good for others is always what's ultimately best for me. A recent study of returning vets with PTSD finds their biggest problem is not flashbacks, but their loss of meaning and purpose. After putting their lives on the line day after day, protecting and supporting their buddies, coming back to our self-centered consumer driven lifestyle leaves them feeling empty and directionless. One psychologist suggested that every returning vet should be automatically placed in the Peace Corps or Ameri-Corps for a year's transition.

Contentment and meaning comes by sharing ourselves with others, by appreciating the givens of life. After all, the sun comes up and sets every day; we have clean air and water; more than enough food to go around. Birds sing, flowers bloom, trees blaze with color, regardless of what we do. We may complain about taxes, entitlements (for everyone but ourselves), a broken infra structure and educational system, but in reality things still work pretty well. If we practiced gratitude we'd stop taking so much for granted and appreciate what others do for us. There are parts of the world where people are suffering. So this Thanksgiving let's remember, its not happiness that creates gratitude but gratitude that creates happiness.

Joyce Shutt is pastor emeritus of the Fairfield Mennonite Church