Yesterday I finished reading Genesis in the rainy weather we were experiencing. It wouldn’t have been that big of an accomplishment except I have never finished Genesis in all the times I have set out to read it.
The skies were angry and the temperatures were cold with the rain driving in the center of the darkened skies.
I was all set up to do the workout at the gym, but with the rain I was unable to find a cab with the weather being so rotten.
I struggled yesterday and wrote how it was probably one of the reasons I listed yesterday, as the morning turned into a comedy of errors. It didn’t dawn on me that what it really was was my inability to find the Sacred in the Ordinary.
It wasn’t more or less than that, it was simply that fact. I was blown away by the power of the Divine and its affect when it is absent or better put, you can’t see or feel it. I believe the Divine is always there it is just a matter of locating it and getting in touch with it.
I was blogging about gratitude yesterday, and the common feelings of warmth and soulful inspiration a person receives for doing their gratitude work. It is a phenomena that is rarely discussed. Gratitude work is rewarding for its simple basic fact, and then you add the Divine affects of gratitude work and it becomes a lot more bigger and more amazing. Gratitude work benefits you on so many levels and leads to great mythical proportions of pleasure and solace of the soul and mind.
Yesterday was a perfect day to bring up gratitude work and all the work it can entail if done right. It is reciprocating and one sees the reciprocity as soon as you look into the gratitude mirror so to speak.
I am confident that people who don’t feel they have something to be grateful for thought deeper and harder they might come up with a thing or two to be grateful for, but maybe not in that some people don’t see the light, and feel the tiniest things in their life to be grateful for.
Gratitude work is not waiting for the grand things in your life to happen or the epic things to happen, it is looking for everyday thankfulness for the Sacred in the Ordinary and the Ordinary is exactly where you are going to find your lessons and examples of gratitude work.
There once was a day when I struggled to get out the gratitude work, and everything was a foggy blur to me, with nothing being clear cut and out to me. Those were the days when I didn’t realize how blessed I was, and how much I had been given, although major things eluded me and I was not in touch with my Sacred in the Ordinary.
I still find with the Sacred in the Ordinary I have lots of work to do, and I feel as though an awakening of some sort is near and when that happens a lot more of the Sacred in the Ordinary will be revealed to me and my gratitude work will become even more simpler.
For me personally, I try to be mindful and do gratitude work in the morning and at night. I am not sure whether it is my Buddhism at work, but my gratitude work usually comes to me in the morning when I am being mindful and intentional about my day and living my life. Gratitude work came to me through my Buddhist practice so it would follow a logical sense that it was through intentional living and mindfulness that my gratitude work arises.
All I know, is that gratitude work is something that is very easy now for me to do, and I don’t know the exact causation of it to give whatever or whomever credit. I know my gratitude work used to be really fast and I was in a rush to get it done and take it off my to do list. Today, I would never put such a thing of my to do list, and it is really easy and I can go on and on about my gratitude for a very long time, and still feel I left things off that I am truly grateful for……
I have thought about maybe once every six months drawing out my gratitude list and writing down everything I am possibly grateful for and seeing if I could exhaust my mind of things I am grateful for but I doubt quite seriously I could exhaust my brain from gratitude items.
Gratitude doesn’t need to be about specific items, and could be much more dynamic and include ideas and concepts instead. I believe I am still in a primitive form of gratitude where I list specific things rather than the ideas and concepts.
Today, I can’t remember when I didn’t do gratitude work. It has been a long time now that I have incorporated gratitude into my life and daily living. It has been less of a time since I started incorporating Grace into my meals. This I have been doing for 3-4 years, and is just a simple thank you for the meal, the resources, and the ability if it is the case to share it with one another.
I urge all of you to do your gratitude work, however that might look to you. I urge you beyond that to think quietly about all the things you are grateful for today and yesterday. Start easy on yourself, there is no getting this right or wrong, and thus no pressure to perform.
Go with what you know and it will work out just fine for you. There is no perfect way to do gratitude work, so whatever suits you is fine and it is most important that you do gratitude work than exactly how you do it. You will develop your own way, and style that suits you and your personality.
-Corey
BORN TO WAY-2016
Coreys Universe 