Is There Something Better Than Gratitude?

Why I’m focusing on the little things right now.

I couldn’t keep my eyes open - I wasn’t trying to go to sleep, mind you. In fact, I was desperately trying to write. Sitting on the couch, laptop perched neatly in the square of my criss-cross-apple-sauced legs; I nodded off between words, between sentences, between thoughts.

I explained all of this to

Sarah Fay

recently, as we discussed my content, my Stack, and my work in general.

"Oh, are you having trouble finding something interesting to write about?" she asked me. I don’t think she understood that what I described was an actual event.

“No,” I told her, “like, I was in the middle of writing and I literally couldn’t keep my eyes open.”

“Oh,” she laughed, “I think you should write about that.”

If you haven’t guessed, I’m still sick and to make things more interesting, I came down with a brutal case of food poisoning last week. Not cool. If there were ever a time to let go, this would be it.

Tis the season. This is how Christmas looks so far.

I was Christmas shopping when it hit, and I had to sit in the middle of the Anthropology in Rockefeller Center. (So, you know, it wasn’t filled with a million people or anything).

“Ma’am (I hate it when they ‘ma’am’ me), are you ok?”

I assured the sweet 20-something hovering above that, yes, I was ok. But I knew I probably wasn’t okay.

This post was supposed to be about gratitude (remember my plans??) And I guess to some extent it will be.

But, I’m finding it hard to write about gratitude. It’s not that I’m ungrateul - I promise, I’m not.

But it’s hard to be grateful when you feel like hell. Any gratitude I can find will have to come in small doses from the small moments right now. I simply have no energy for any type of overarching gratitude. And maybe that’s the way it should be.

Perhaps to truly be grateful, you must be specific and minute - intentional and in the moment. Perhaps this is my lesson. Perhaps like all writing, the discovery here is more for me than for you.

I feel like the term gratitude is overused and (dare I say?) diluted.

What does it even mean anymore? I have my gratitude lists, my gratitude journals and my gratitude whatevers, and I’m not sure they’re even doing anything for me anymore. I’m just not feeling it.

I’m finding myself focused more on appreciation instead. Appreciation feels better when I think about it- it feels better in my body, if that makes sense.

Appreciation feels easier somehow and I wonder if that’s because I find it easier to break appreciation up into small pieces. I can appreciate that my husband takes out the garbage anytime he notices it’s full. I can appreciate how he is always there for me when I roll over in the middle of the night and touch the small of his back.

But for me to simply insist that I’m grateful for my husband doesn’t mean as much somehow. It doesn’t make me feel - well anything- really. And gratitude, at its core, should help you shift your internal energy. You should feel something when you practice it.

It’s almost like appreciation brings in the love.

Love is my destination - it’s where I want to live. It’s where I want to be.

Especially during the holidays.

Christmas scenery never fails to bring at least some joy!

So today I’m looking for appreciation.

Where can I find it?

What can I look for to appreciate in my ‘right now’ circumstance? In those around me?

Please know how much I appreciate you. Your support means the world to me.

Happy Holidays -

S