Focus…

Today I rode with a friend on a cool early morning.  We rode into some sleet and light rain and got a little more cold than we had bargained for.  The ride had the potential to turn into something miserable.  We rode a little harder and our bodies responded by warming up.  

Like so much of life, it was less than perfect.

We still, however, enjoyed the ride.  We focused on the gift and the fact that we were able to ride.  I wish it were so easy with family, friends, and clients… 

Today, THE big meal awaits.  Miss is already busy in the kitchen.  She’s been busy for days putting together all the details to make our Thanksgiving a memorable one.  She’s been focused.  Me, not so much.  Yes, I have much to be thankful for.  Do you?

Think about America.

This crazy experiment, taken by less than perfect but desperate men and women only a few hundred years ago, still has some legs.  We wobble quite often.  We sometimes appear to be sawing our own legs out from under ourselves.  What’s up with that!  We lean way too far back to keep our balance, yet somehow we have yet to FALL.  This experiment is less than perfect, but man does it beat the alternative.

Today, as you sit in your comfortable chairs around your cozy Thanksgiving Day table, take a few minutes and remember “why” you are able to do so.  Do NOT focus your mind on what you’ve done to earn it.  Focus your mind, instead, on what others have done before you arrived on this planet, before you were brought into this country, or before the internet gave us this ease with which we can connect. Remember, your focus matters as does mine.  We choose.  Our choices have consequences.

Focus on the blessing.

Focus on the blessing from your less than perfect family tree.  Focus on the blessing from your less than perfect community.  Focus on the blessing from your less than perfect company.  Focus on the blessing from your less than perfect love and your less than perfect lover.  Focus on the blessing from your less than perfect friends.  Focus on the blessing from ABOVE.  Focus on the greatest gift.  His gift of GRACE.

Acknowledge His perfection.

AND, remember that you didn’t earn Grace.  Nor did you earn your “freedom,” in so many ways.  Gratitude comes from our attitude, I’ll grant that.  

Our attitude, however, is much more complicated.  We all tend to feel the injustices committed against us as if we’ve been “cut to the bone.”  We feel somewhat differently when we make a “mistake” toward another.  We feel those injustices are blown out of proportion and inform our family, friends, and clients to simply get over it.  After all, we’ve barely delivered a prick to the skin…

We really have to work to focus the mind and the heart if we’re to develop empathy for another when our focus is naturally so self centered.  As Anais Nin said many moons ago, “We don’t see things the way they are, we see things the way we are.”  

Today, take the time to focus on how much you’ve been given.  Reflect on the Grace you’ve been offered and the power that comes with receiving.  

Enjoy your meal and your time with your less than perfect family and friends.  Focus on the blessing.

Oh, and thank you for putting up with my less than perfect writing and my way less than perfect grammar.

Happy Thanksgiving…