Being grateful...

Some days I am filled with an inordinate sense of gratitude. The feeling comes about naturally on certain occasions but some of the time it needs more than a gentle reminder. If you think about it, most of us have plenty to be grateful about. Most of us are reasonable healthy individuals with some ability to earn enough to meet our basic requirements. Provided we live in an environment that does not curtail personal freedom, we can go after whatever it is that we think will enrich our lives. Most of us therefore, have absolutely no right to feel ungrateful for life and the blessings it brings.

I have been prone to place conditions on happiness and gratitude. I postpone those feelings because for me everything is conditional on my son progressing or gaining in learning or mastering skills or any such achievement. I forget to be happy about the support that I get from well-meaning friends and family. I forget to be grateful that I have the health and will to fight for my child and others like him. I forget to be thankful for the ability to be creative and to write down words that just might touch another’s heart and bring joy or hope.

Then I see a video of a woman who is supposedly the world’s ugliest. She is 24 years old and weighs a mere 64 pounds. She suffers from some rare syndrome since birth. She has the most amazing parents who tell her that she is beautiful and strong and nothing should hold her back. Despite an illness that would have debilitated another, she managed to pursue all of her dreams. She is currently publishing her third book, just finished college and is a wonderful motivational speaker. What shines through is her positive outlook on life despite seemingly insurmountable odds. What I loved best about her speech on TED was her response to a comment someone made on a video of hers that went viral on youtube. The person wrote that she should do the world a favour and just shoot herself because she was far too ugly to live. She got hurt at first not knowing why her mere existence was reason for such hatred. And then she thumbed her nose at the naysayers and the idiots and used the negativity as a fuel to go after all that she really wanted in life. Truly an inspiring figure and one that taught me how much I have to be grateful for.

Today another friend posted a video of a girl with only one leg dancing in a talent show. She danced like an angel. The loss of a leg after a nasty accident had left her and her family devastated. Her father had passed away years ago. Her mother and two siblings were all she had. They looked like regular middle class folk. Her mother was crying throughout her performance. At the end of it all, you could not help but applaud the simple woman’s strength and willpower that encouraged her daughter to do things that seemed impossible. The girl herself went through unspeakable pain but her fighting spirit was definitely fostered by her mother’s belief. Here was more inspiration that left me in tears. There is no limit for the human ability to endure.

I sit back and think how I want my son to be when he grows up. He will be slightly eccentric. He will be happy and with some luck he will be loved intensely as well. I want him to know that he can do anything at all and that despite his mother’s inability to be strong always, she can still teach him how to fight against all odds and how to smile when things seem hardest. I want him to know that he can make it in this unfriendly world. I want him to learn to be grateful for himself. With gratitude alone will come the blessings he needs to grow as a person.