Great-full

It’s been a lot of moaning from me on here lately, but with my favorite (thankful) holiday around the corner and the end of this year in sight, I can feel a shift happening.

I see rest and recuperation on the horizon. I see a new year approaching, and it makes me even more grateful for the many positive things in my life.

At the same time, it is incumbent upon me to acknowledge (and, where possible, mitigate) the myriad, unfair reasons I find myself in such a privileged position. As I was ruminating on how best to formulate and express this thought, I read a recent post from my favorite meditation app and there it was - “ethical gratitude.”

“Cultivating gratitude should also lead to empathy and solidarity. By remembering what it is like to suffer, either in my own life or in myths I share with my community, I recommit myself to ending oppression everywhere. By recognizing the privilege and good fortune that I enjoy, I commit myself to lessening the suffering of others. In this way, cultivating gratitude expands beyond selfish appreciation and toward ethical responsibility.

That’s even true when our remembrance rituals are, themselves, deeply flawed – like Thanksgiving. It’s a bitter irony, really, that a holiday about gratitude is also rooted in European colonialism and the genocide of Native Americans – even if the traditional Thanksgiving story is fictional, which it is.

So, if you choose to celebrate Thanksgiving (as I do), it offers an invitation to cultivate a more mature, ethical gratitude than just I’m #blessed, so everything is fine! My good fortune is, in part, rooted in the founding injustices of the American experience. What can I do to (slightly, partially, incrementally) remedy that?

There is so much to be thankful for, as we (maybe) emerge from the worst of the pandemic: the astonishing advances of science, the shared sacrifices we made, the heroism of healthcare and other essential workers, and so much more.  

The fact is, we are all walking around traumatized by the pandemic.  We haven’t processed what we’ve been through, or the fact that, just as we thought we were done with it, we found out that we weren’t.   

This is especially important because the very things we have to be grateful for – science, communal responsibility, critical thinking – are also being attacked. Even at your own Thanksgiving gatherings, you may have to practice wise communication, careful speech, and attentive listening.  You may just need to take some deep breaths to stay calm. 

And there is still the possibility of connection.  All of us, regardless of our religious or political affiliations, are walking around traumatized by the past eighteen months.  Whatever our beliefs, we all have unprocessed grief, rage, and fear that is often too painful to touch.  Perhaps our vulnerability can bring us together.

This Thanksgiving can be a time for that shared reflection. Most of us made it, though many of us did not.  Now is a time to give thanks, to grieve, and to recommit to the truths that sustain us.”