Day of Wonder
Thanksgiving, honestly the notion gives me...vibes. That isn’t to say the idea isn’t good, but my relationship with gratitude has developed a lot of baggage. “It isn’t that bad, you should be thankful” is an all-too-familiar thought. Invalidation is a winning strategy, innit. I’ve habitually employed gratitude as a means to an end, instrumental or conditional-- doing it because it would deliver me from pain or induce a joyous state. Of course, if I practice gratitude with my eyes solely on the benefits I lose both the practice and the benefits.
This is an unfortunate lesson that I keep having to learn. I sang because of the benefits and never learned how to sing for its own sake. I played piano for the benefits and never learned how to play for its own sake. I did so many things, not because of the joy of just doing them, but because of how they made me feel or what they gave me access to. And because we cannot guarantee the outcomes of our efforts, when the outcomes stop being what we want then suddenly the behaviors themselves stop. Any wonder I haven’t sang or played the piano in months?
The practice of virtues, such as gratitude, is not some sort of cosmic vending machine into which we insert effort and receive some sort of predetermined, automatic outcome proportional to our input. Unfortunately, that is how I learned to practice gratitude anyway. Oops.
But there IS a concept I know I can connect to today, and that is:
Wonder.
As I drove about my business earlier today, I took a look at my hand. Just looked at it, turned it around, looked at the creases, the pores, the lines of my fingerprints.
When was the last time you saw the magnificence of your own hands? These two most fundamental of instruments that permit us a world in which to live. These two channels of good or ill, depending on how we employ ourselves. When was the last time you looked into a lover’s eyes, really looked, and beheld their love? When was the last time you took a deep breath and realized the incredible gift it is to take a breath at all? When was the last time you really looked at your children, REALLY looked at them, and realized the wonders of possibility their innocent mayhem represents? When was the last time you really beheld the cashier at the register, the uber driver taking you to your hotel, the waitress writing down your order? When was the last time you held a friend breaking down in your arms facing a divorce or a death or a loss of a career? When was the last time, loves?
Every perception we have can invoke wonder. Even the most boring or painful moment represents an absolute riot of color and meaning. Wonder infuses everything.
I connect to wonder over gratitude because I never tried to use wonder as anything other than an end in itself. In considering its spiritual benefits, I came to view gratitude as a practical necessity, and while that isn’t inherently bad, it is not gratitude but WONDER. Wonder! Wonder, that connects me to the well of meaning available in each moment of life. That I feel pain and misery and heartache and anxiety and boredom are all redeemed by the fact that I can even experience them at all.
See your hands, loves. See your loved ones, and today root yourselves in the joy that you exist at all, that you ever had a chance to see, to perceive, to feel, to be in the first place.
Maybe one day I can reclaim gratitude. It will start with wonder.
This is an unfortunate lesson that I keep having to learn. I sang because of the benefits and never learned how to sing for its own sake. I played piano for the benefits and never learned how to play for its own sake. I did so many things, not because of the joy of just doing them, but because of how they made me feel or what they gave me access to. And because we cannot guarantee the outcomes of our efforts, when the outcomes stop being what we want then suddenly the behaviors themselves stop. Any wonder I haven’t sang or played the piano in months?
The practice of virtues, such as gratitude, is not some sort of cosmic vending machine into which we insert effort and receive some sort of predetermined, automatic outcome proportional to our input. Unfortunately, that is how I learned to practice gratitude anyway. Oops.
But there IS a concept I know I can connect to today, and that is:
Wonder.
As I drove about my business earlier today, I took a look at my hand. Just looked at it, turned it around, looked at the creases, the pores, the lines of my fingerprints.
When was the last time you saw the magnificence of your own hands? These two most fundamental of instruments that permit us a world in which to live. These two channels of good or ill, depending on how we employ ourselves. When was the last time you looked into a lover’s eyes, really looked, and beheld their love? When was the last time you took a deep breath and realized the incredible gift it is to take a breath at all? When was the last time you really looked at your children, REALLY looked at them, and realized the wonders of possibility their innocent mayhem represents? When was the last time you really beheld the cashier at the register, the uber driver taking you to your hotel, the waitress writing down your order? When was the last time you held a friend breaking down in your arms facing a divorce or a death or a loss of a career? When was the last time, loves?
Every perception we have can invoke wonder. Even the most boring or painful moment represents an absolute riot of color and meaning. Wonder infuses everything.
I connect to wonder over gratitude because I never tried to use wonder as anything other than an end in itself. In considering its spiritual benefits, I came to view gratitude as a practical necessity, and while that isn’t inherently bad, it is not gratitude but WONDER. Wonder! Wonder, that connects me to the well of meaning available in each moment of life. That I feel pain and misery and heartache and anxiety and boredom are all redeemed by the fact that I can even experience them at all.
See your hands, loves. See your loved ones, and today root yourselves in the joy that you exist at all, that you ever had a chance to see, to perceive, to feel, to be in the first place.
Maybe one day I can reclaim gratitude. It will start with wonder.
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