Leaning into the “struggles of the world” ie engaging with civic and political affairs is as natural to me as breathing. My leanings are focused these days and years toward re-learning Canadian history as a third generation settler Canadian on the path to being an honourable ally to Indigenous Canadians.

Feeling grateful is ephemeral and conditional, whereas being grateful is lasting and unconditional. I choose the latter as path and practice. Still early days.

As Kristi Nelson might say 🙂
—respond to the invitation to wake up grateful
—continue the practice of taking nothing for granted.

Thing 1- sending a text of appreciation to my stylist for an excellent cut.
Thing 2 – expressing interconnectedness with the First Nation in Lytton BC by sending money after a fire destroyed their whole village.
Thing 3 – being here for my friend in a dark time as she starts chemotherapy.
Thing 4 – hosting a cozy simpatico birthday supper for neighbour friends.

In silence – or in quiet (which is more available to me) I can think clearly and pray deeply. Sometimes at-onement happens.
And I realize I don’t have enough of it.

Movement practices, Essentrics and Iyengar yoga.
Physical activities,-bike riding, walking, swimming,
Gratefulness practice,
Friendships. .

My dear friend who is living into a serious cancer diagnosis. In the midst of making decisions about treatment she is her usual excited self about our in person visit and doing the fun stuff we enjoy. Like swimming in a lake, a bike ride, gathering for dinner with friends.

What comes naturally to me is an impulse to create gatherings – community building I suppose you could say. Some become ongoing groups with a focus others are one off “pop up” gatherings. This serves the world as humans need to feel we belong!

oh my gosh. No problem having fun daily! Today for example – a walkabout downtown to see the beautiful Les Fleurs de Ville installations, refreshment on a sunny patio, a teeny “voyage” across the Creek, a bike ride at the seaside before supper, funny wordplay sprinkled throughout. Awash in gratitude; it could be otherwise.

The scientists, public health experts , health care providers and policy makers who have brought us to a promising place in the pandemic. Today I receive my second dose of the vaccine. It’s miraculous.

By giving much less psychic energy to regrets and self criticism — tendencies which are tiresome and life denying.

Initiating, co-facilitating and sustaining the “friendly conversation circle” for ESL newcomers to my city.

The question has done its work in me. It’s been simmering all day and prompted me to write my cousin with whom I rarely connect. Gratefulness inspires me to not take her presence in my life for granted and to take a few minutes to express my appreciation and love for her – just not too overtly or she would squirm. lol.

Practicing gratefulness moves me towards good things such as right relationships, contentment, being grounded in reality, delight and wonder.

The natural world is life and interconnection, truth and beauty, Beholding nature reminds me (when I get out of my head to stop look and listen) that life and beauty have the last word.

Genes, ancestry, family of origin, place, generation, chosen family and friends, soul journey companions including this space, unhealed hurts and trauma, innate wisdom and a well of joie de vivre.

I am energized by novelty. Since acquiring an electric bike, my partner and I regularly discover new parts of our city and region.
On an interior level, in this early autumn season of life I feel like everything I encounter is for the first time. “Always we begin again” as the Benedictines say. Come to everything with a ”beginner’s mind” as the meditators say.

Aligning small and big choices with
tending, reverencing, honouring
Earth,
our only home.

Movement! Walking, bike riding, Essentrics, Iyengar yoga.

Right now I’m “sitting at the feet” of Kristi Nelson and Br David drinking in their practical real life wisdom in the course Wake Up Grateful. The guidance to take nothing for granted
is the heart of it.