Today I want to begin a practice that I hope will turn into a daily discipline and alter how I relate to God, to others and even to myself, I was struck a couple of weeks ago by a response to a simple act of expressing thanks. Quite simply that response was thankfulness returned. We live in a difficult world, there is so much negativity, so much horror and so much darkness, and yet even in the darkness there is light, and that light when seen and celebrated, encouraged and expressed will shine all the brighter. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness will not overcome it…

So I want to practice looking for light, and today I want to start a practice of that, so this is just the beginning of my list;

1. I am thankful firends and neighbours who have taken time to write me a Christmas card,  those with notes and letters and those without now brighten my front room.
2. I am thankful for warmth and good coffee as I sit and write this.
3. I am thankful,for time with family over the weekend, and the time to come, even in the busyness of the next few days.
4. I am thankful that I have the privilege of clebrating Christmas in peace, and the space to create a space to pray for this troubled world, to give others the opportunity to do the same.
5. I am thankful for the quiet beauty of this day, for the view from my window, and the lights I am able to surround myself with.
6. I am thankful for love, expressed and unexpressed, and hope to live into a deeper awareness of it.
7. I am thankful for friends who have supported me,  prayed for me, and encouraged me though some difficult times, and for new friends who have shared laughter and joy with me over the last few days….

My list could go on, and I am thankful for that too, it is quite amazing when I stop to think on it how much there is to be thankful for. My tendency is to be a glass half empty sort of a person, and I would like that to change, and to see how that changes me. So if you are reading this, thank you, maybe you would like to start a practice of thankfulness too.

Photo, morning sky (mine)