Building a Gratitude Practice: Day 5

​We are a culture of insatiability. We are inadvertently taught that we can never have enough. As a result, we live our lives from a place of scarcity: we believe we are falling short, that we are in short supply. We are constantly striving, buying, building.
 
As someone in the mental health field, I love personal development and growth! But, we rarely stop and say “I am enough. I have enough.”
 
In my home this past week, we’ve been practicing gratitude to recognize our abundance. We are trying to not live lives of scarcity. We have started to notice every tiny thing we have that is bringing us comfort, joy, and sustainability. Every little thing has taken on new meaning. We’ve limited our consuming behaviors and practiced appreciating.
 
I will never say that the COVID-19 pandemic was a good thing: I don’t believe inflicting pain and trauma on a mass numbers of individuals is necessary. And at the same time, within our own homes or communities, I have felt the practice of abundance and gratitude immensely. Yes, I can feel pain and gratitude at the same time.
 
We have enough. We are enough. We don’t need one more thing in order to maintain our happiness. And while we have heard repetitive adages throughout our lives (“money can’t buy you happiness”, or “the best things in life are free”), I can’t say I’ve ever allowed myself to feel the true sentiment of those statements before this past month.
 
In New York City, resources are definitely stretched thin. Even getting groceries at this time is hard. It’s scary to see no available timeslots for delivery on Instacart, Fresh Direct, and Amazon Fresh. And yet, we have enough in our refrigerator and pantry (albeit, it’s might require a bit of creativity in the coming weeks!). It is in fact this mindset that then allows us to give back to those who do not have what we have. When we recognize our own abundance, we can donate food, clothing, money, resources, time, energy, to others. This is one thing I personally have gained from the pandemic that I hope does stay with me once we are back to our daily lives.
 
For our final day, shift your mindset from one of scarcity to one of abundance. Look at your clothing, your food, the books on your shelf, your streaming services. I am living a life of abundance!