Gratitude and grace

A grateful and a gracious attitude both are needed, we all agreed. Last weekend when my YaYa group gathered for food, wine and conversation, the subject of occasionally feeling sorry for ourselves came up. We admitted that we all do it at times.

It isn't too long ago that I wrote a blog about a Pity Party I was having that day. It's far too easy to look at someone else's life and envy it. Everything looks so perfect and smooth on the outside. And we know, from the inside, what our own life looks like. My wise friend Gayle often says, "Don't judge your insides by someone else's outsides." Yes, yes, yes. When all I know of someone's life is what I see on the outside, I really have no idea of what fears and anxieties that person carries on the inside. I have no idea of the relationship, career, financial or other problems she has.

So we YaYas agreed that it's far better for us to shift our focus from self-pity to gratitude. And it takes some real grace to do that. It takes a forbearing attitude—toward others and also toward ourselves. It takes forgiveness and an attitude of acceptance, compassion and care. It requires a stance of non-judgmentalism and detachment: not placing value judgments on everything and everyone we observe. We need to stay positive insofar as that is possible.

I really do want to experience as much serenity and inner joy as I can. Toward that end, I'm going to try focus even more on the two G's: gratitude and grace.