THANKSGIVING IS APPROACHING. This is the time of year we are frequently called to focus upon gratitude.
What is gratitude, really?
Is it simply an acknowledgement of the things and beings that matter to us? Or is there more to it?
In order to understand gratitude, we must first acknowledge the human tendency to focus on life’s problems.
We do this because we’re wired with what is called “negativity bias” — an evolutionary instinct to look out for threats so that we can avoid them or escape them unharmed.
We can learn to work with negativity bias. But, it’s not as simple as flipping a gratitude switch.
The cultivation of gratitude takes intention and work.
Otherwise, it can become a glorified form of denial, a way of papering over problems by labeling everything in life “a blessing.”
Gratitude requires an awakening, a presence of mind that acknowledges the many millions of things that must come together in order for us to be alive and to be miraculously part of something, rather than nothing.
We who live on the North Olympic Peninsula are among the lucky ones.
It is almost impossible to get through the day without encountering breathtaking beauty.
We inhabit a living world of blue waters, green forests and a stunning abundance of creatures large and small.
All we have to do is step or look outside and we are reminded of our indebtedness to something beyond ourselves.
Gratitude finds its full measure through our participation in and witness of the interconnected web of life.
In her poem, “Messenger,” Mary Oliver calls this the work of loving the world:
My work is loving the world.
Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird —
equal seekers of sweetness.
Here the quickening yeast; there the blue plums.
Here the clam deep in the speckled sand.
Are my boots old? Is my coat torn?
Am I no longer young, and still not half-perfect? Let me keep my mind on what matters,
which is my work, which is mostly standing still and learning to be astonished.
The phoebe, the delphinium.
The sheep in the pasture, and the pasture.
Which is mostly rejoicing, since all the ingredients are here,
which is gratitude, to be given a mind and a heart
and these body-clothes,
a mouth with which to give shouts of joy
to the moth and the wren, to the sleepy dug-up clam,
telling them all, over and over, how it is
that we live forever.
Gratitude happens when our sense of presence is awakened to our interconnection with all the other presences that surround us.
Whether your spiritual expressions of gratitude are directed to God, Mother Earth or to the universe: May your Thanksgiving be full of this awareness.
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Issues of Faith is a rotating column by five religious leaders on the North Olympic Peninsula. The Rev. Kate Lore is a minister at the Quimper Unitarian Universalist Fellowship in Port Townsend. Her email is katelore@gmail.com.
