Every morning when I wake up, the first thing I do is walk through our home and thank God for my husband, our children and the incredible life we are living. As I reflect on everything happening in the world and watch with horror what some families here and abroad are going through, I wonder why we are so blessed. I have gotten up thinking these same thoughts for years even though disappointment, pain, death, broken relationships and other unpleasant intrusions find their way into our lives, I still feel blessed and wonder why we get to live such incredible lives.
Today, however, I woke up with a very strong desire to think beyond my usual abbreviated morning appreciation. The mind is a wonderful force that each person should find a way to listen to. Although difficult to do, the thousand of random thoughts flashing though our brains are selected by our mind to be processed and acted upon. And therein lies the keyword for my abbreviated appreciation; thoughts are to be processed and acted upon. Processed to determine which thoughts will enrich your existence and which thoughts are simply fleeting pleasantries or useless complaints. Acted upon to recognize and harness the wonderful thoughts designed to enrich your life.
Why do so many of us get to live incredible lives? Perhaps if we just open our eyes and appreciate what we see, the unpleasant intrusions will be overshadowed by all the good in our lives. Our lives can be incredible if we learn how to see the ugly but reduce it’s role to minor status while acknowledging it, fixing it, then sidelining it or omitting it completely in order to pay attention to the good that will outweigh the ugly every single time.
My incredible life unfolded for me when I was cleaning out my emails and was completely stunned by the over 600 emails written by my husband while we were dating particularly since he said he didn’t email. I did wake up that morning thanking God for all that is given to me but I went further, I took action. I began to write about what happened to me in the winter of my life that changed me completely from being appreciative to wanting to share my story hoping that it would influence others to open their eyes to love.
As I look back on my moment of discovery of good outweighing ugly, I realized I found happiness and fulfillment by just recapturing all the special moments my husband and I shared now and while dating and then the most amazing thing happened, I fell in love with him all over again.