Gratitude
Its the Sunday before Thanksgiving. It would be wrong not to stop for a moment, during my crazy life and give thanks. We have much to be grateful for. There are many life lessons that can be interwoven amongst these moments of thanks.
1. I am grateful for who I am today.
We have been through some difficult struggles throughout my life. Financial, emotional, health, family, identity, death and loss. I have lived through unbelievable goodness and abundance; three healthy children, a wonderful husband, sealing in the temple, health, friendship, testimony and belief. Despite the goodness, and the blessings, my greatest life lessons, and strength of character has come from my challenges. Those challenges teach me and mold me, they prepare me, they stretch me. Today I am grateful for my challenges.
2. I am grateful for my children.
The relationship a mother has with her children ebbs and flows throughout time. This relationships can most easily be seen with a mother and her teenage daughter. Often it is stereotyped by emotions, and drama on the part of the daughter.
I have felt particularly grateful for my children on this day. As I was pregnant with Allyson, I really felt Brennan clung to Jonny for emotional support as he identified that I was not my best self. Since I have had Ally, 10 months ago, my relationship with Brennan has re-emerged. He needs me in a way that is irrevocable. It is unreplaceable and is totally vital to his complete development. It is the most humbling experience to feel the longing of your children for your love, for your attention, for the safety of your arms, for your reassurance. I feel, and have had this same awareness at different times with each of my children.
My children are each precious in their own, unique way. They are each a blessing, a bestowal of power, of authority, of innocence. They are a gift from Heavenly Father, and tonight I am grateful to be their mother.
3. I am grateful for my husband.
I am grateful for the protecting arms that can hold me, the strong vision of encouragement, and the strength in the priesthood that protects me. I am so grateful for the love I receive and for the acceptance I feel from my husband. When I was 16, I nannied for a family, the Gerrish’s. Jill, the Mother, and I were dear friends. She explained that when she was falling in love, she could feel everything moment, every emotions, like it was right on the surface of her skin. As she married, and lived with her husband, that relationship became deeper, it infiltrated throughout her entire being. Just like blood flows through our veins and is vital to our daily existence, so too is that relationship of marriage. It goes unnoticed largely, but on occasion, emotions, experience and life pulls from that wellspring of love. Then the relationship is on the surface.
We have been married for ten and a half years. Together, for 11 1/2. I am grateful for the love that grows, for the sealing that binds us, and the courage we have to walk forward in faith.
4. I am grateful to be a wife.
I have lived with a single mother, I have lived with a married mother, I am a granddaughter of a dedicated and openly in love grandparents, I am a member of a church where marriage is valued. I also am part of a society who so often devalues motherhood, the importance of commitment, and the relationship of husband and wife, the way the Lord sees it.
I am grateful to a partner with my husband. I am grateful to provide life to my children and to my marriage. I am grateful to my Heavenly Father for giving me Jonny. He truly is the love of my life. I am grateful to have the opportunity to serve him, to love him, to work with him, and to create a life for my children.
5. I am grateful for Jesus Christ
His life was embittered with challenge and heartache. He was riddled with naysayers and turbulence. He lived hungry, tired, sad and often broken hearted. Why? He loves us. Line upon line he learned, the Holy Spirit whispering to him the mission he would perform, the agony he would endure. Why? Through life experience he would learn what it meant to suffer, to be sad, to lose, to endure betrayal. It is one thing to know, another to do and even another to live. He did this all for me, for Jonny, for Anna, for Brennan, for Ally.
In perspective to my own life, I feel Christ’s influence in my calling, in my children, in my direction. I feel so weak at times and wish I were more consistent in my longing towards the Him. I have been promised that we would be successful as we put the Savior first. What does that mean and how do I accomplish that goal? Daily doing.
6. I am grateful for my heritage
I love my grandparents. I am so grateful for Grandma Joy and for Grandpa Dave. I am so grateful for the strength that empowers me, that has come directly from my ancestors. The love they give me is real, the support that comes from them is real. Endearment has grown by powers given beyond the veil. I want to honor their name, and I want to live my life to make them proud.
