Put Yourself in Life’s Shoes
Guest post by Julia Osovskaya
“When it comes to life the critical thing is whether you take things for granted or take them with gratitude.” - Gilbert K. Chesterton
It’s hard to deny that the world can be a very negative place at times, and it’s certainly not helpful when people help this negativity build and prosper. Log in to any social networking platform, check your dashboard and you’ll see people complaining about all sorts of things. Many of the complainers are repeated offenders too, and at some point you start seeing people complain about other people’s constant complaints – it might as well become a vicious circle. So how do we break it off?
It might seem like I have one answer for all of life’s problems, but yes, it’s gratitude yet again. It just works. To help you see what I mean and put things in perspective, let’s take a moment and try to put ourselves in life’s shoes.
We are made to wish for and want a lot of things, and personally, I don’t see anything wrong with it. After all, desire is a natural part of being healthy and alive. Just look back at a time when you fell really sick and only wished and begged to get better sooner, instead of daydreaming about a tropical getaway or a pair of new shoes, and you’ll see what I’m talking about.
But in wanting things it’s important not to break the promise we give to ourselves. How often do we think “If only I could get a chance to do that and that and get this and this, then I would be so happy”? And how often do we forget all about it once we reach our goal? Or, another scenario - we work hard on pursuing each and every thing on our wish and to-do lists only to get frustrated and angry about not having accomplished all of it. What I suggest is that we take a moment to rejoice at what we’ve gained instead of not letting ourselves enjoy those things and focusing our attention on things we didn’t gain instead. In other words, instead of whining about what you could’ve had, find some time to appreciate and be happy about the things that are now yours. Because otherwise… What’s the point of wanting and asking for more if you’re not going to be content with it anyway?
If you were the Life, God or Universe (it doesn’t matter what you believe to be the higher power or what you call it – gratitude unites all), would you be willing to give something to someone if you knew they wouldn’t care to enjoy it the way they promised they would? I don’t think so. Put yourself in life’s shoes and look at it from a different point of view. Ralph Marston has probably said it best:
“What if you gave someone a gift, and they neglected to thank you for it - would you be likely to give them another? Life is the same way. In order to attract more of the blessings that life has to offer, you must truly appreciate what you already have.”
Julia Osovskaya is a thankful spirit who believes that positive thinking, optimistic attitude and thankful mindset go a long way. Having completed a personal blog challenge of giving thanks daily for 365 days in a row, she has made it a mission to spread the word about life transformational power of gratitude. In addition to being a thankful person, Julia writes for blogs about chair design and all things golden and works in the social media marketing.
