Appreciate the Commonplace

The enlightened give thanks for what most people take for granted.
- Michael Beckwith

The invariable mark of wisdom is to
see the miraculous in the common.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

A thankful heart is the greatest virtue.
- Cicero

Today's affirmation:
I find joy and inspiration in the commonplace
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: The Commonplace

Simple Pleasures

Beauty is Everywhere
    

Give Thanks - Today

I thank you God for this most amazing day,
for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and for the blue dream of sky
and for everything which is natural,
which is infinite, which is yes.
- e. e. cummings

Thank you, God, for this good life
and forgive us if we do not love it enough.
- Garrison Keillor

Most people are more skilled at begging God than at thanking God.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Today's Affirmation:
I give thanks for the bounties of this world.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Gratitude for THIS Moment

Give Thanks and Celebrate

Thankful and Content

Give Thanks for the Commonplace
    

Thankfulness Makes Life Better

 

A thankful heart is not only the greatest virtue,
but the parent of all other virtues.
- Cicero

If the only prayer you said in your whole life was,
Thank You, that would suffice.
- Meister Eckhart

However much or little you have,
"Thank You" is always a more powerful prayer than, "I need more."
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Whoever does not regard what he has
as most ample wealth, is unhappy,
though he be master of the world.
- Epictetus

God gave you a gift of 86,400 seconds today.
Have you used one to say "thank you?"
- William Arthur Ward

Further reading: The Power of Gratitude

Gratitude for Small Miracles

Zero-Based Gratitude

Unanswered Prayer
     

Try Looking at Things from a New Perspective

 

Half the joy of life is in little things taken on the run...
but let us keep our hearts young and our eyes open
that nothing worth our while shall escape us.
- Victor Cherbuliez

Joy is what happens to us when we allow ourselves
to recognize how good things really are.
- Marianne Williamson

Look for joy in your life; it's not always easy to find.
- Charles Kuralt

Happiness often sneaks in through a door you didn't know you left open.
- John Barrymore

Often, the greatest joy is to be found not in new things,
but in old things seen through new eyes.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Life Lessons I Learned From My Cat

Is your glass of life half empty? Or half full?

Life is Beautiful

What we enjoy constitutes our abundance

How To Be Happy In Life
     

Focus on Gratitude

 

Count your blessings - not your troubles.
- Dale Carnegie

In a society that has you counting money, pounds, calories, and steps,
be a rebel and count your blessings instead.
- Rev. Lisa Heckman

It is always a good day to be grateful for all of life -
grateful for large blessings and small.
Especially to be grateful for the symbolic blessings -
the rainbows and butterflies that come into our lives
when we least expect and most need them.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

If only the people who worry about their liabilities
would think about the riches they do possess,
they would stop worrying.
- Dale Carnegie

Further reading: Step Back, Gain Perspective

Beyond Worries

May You Be Blessed
    

Appreciate Your Blessings

 

With gratitude, all life appears as a blessing -
without gratitude, all of life
is perceived as a burden.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

When you arise in the morning,
give thanks for the morning light, for your life and strength.
Give thanks for your food, and the joy of living.
If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies with yourself.
- Tecumseh

We tend to forget that happiness doesn't
come as a result of getting something we don't have,
but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have.
- Frederick Koenig

Gratitude Brings Out the Bright Colors of Life.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Giving Thanks for Our Food

What do you take for granted?

Celebrating the Small Miracles of Our Lives

My Glass of Life
    

Never Take Life for Granted

 

As soon as man does not take his existence for granted,
but beholds it as something unfathomably mysterious,
thought begins.
- Albert Schweitzer

God is not what you imagine,
or what you think you understand.
If you understand you have failed.
- Saint Augustine

Be thankful that life is a mystery.
There is so much we can never know.
Breathe deeply and relax into the not-knowing.
There is much that we do not have to know in order to live joyfully.
We Can Never Understand Our World, But We Can Still Enjoy It.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

The world is incomprehensible.
We won't ever understand it;
we won't ever unravel its secrets.
Thus we must treat the world as it is:
a sheer mystery.
- Carlos Castaneda

Uncertainty that comes from knowledge
(knowing what you don't know)
is different from uncertainty coming from ignorance.
- Isaac Asimov

Further reading: Wonder and Mystery

Pause to Wonder

Cherish Mystery

Life: Mystery and Riddle
    

Gratitude is Powerful

 

Is your glass of life
half empty?
Or half full?

Be Grateful for All of Life:
Each of us has been infinitely blessed - beginning with the gift of life.
Whatever may appear to be missing or broken on any particular day,
our glass is not half full, it is 99.9% full.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie - from 7 Secrets for a Happy Life

I don't think of all the misery,
but of the beauty that still remains.
- Anne Frank

We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures.
- Thornton Wilder

However much or little you have,
"Thank You" is always a more powerful prayer than, "I need more."
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Thank You God

Life Really Is Good

Appreciate Your Blessings

My Glass of Life
          

A Month of Giving Thanks 2025

 

Thanksgiving is my favorite American holiday, as being grateful for everything, especially for the gift of life itself, is at the top of my list of values. Will you join me in a celebration of Gratitude and Thanksgiving for the entire month of November?

[For ME, Thanksgiving is a Celebration of Gratitude for all our Blessings, and independent of the events of 1621 - which is an entirely different subject]

Affirmation:
I commit the whole month of November to expressing gratitude and thanksgiving.

Suppose our gratitude could be zero-based gratitude.
With zero-based gratitude,
we would be grateful for everything we had each day -
regardless of whether it was more or less than yesterday.
With zero-based gratitude, I can be grateful for all the people,
the love, the food, the shelter, the services,
the health, that I am blessed with today,
regardless of what I had yesterday.
With zero-based gratitude,
I can be grateful each day for the gift of life itself.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie -- Read about Zero-Based Gratitude

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life.
It turns what we have into enough, and more.
It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity.
It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend.
Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.
- Melody Beattie

He who can give thanks for little
will always find he has enough.
- Anonymous

Gratitude bestows reverence, allowing us to encounter
everyday epiphanies, those transcendent moments of awe
that change forever how we experience life and the world.
- John Milton

Further reading: Know that You have been Blessed

Recognizing Our Abundance

The Truly Rich

Gratitude for THIS Moment

My Glass of Life
      

There is Always Much to be Thankful For

 

Gratitude is the inward feeling of kindness received.
Thankfulness is the natural impulse to express that feeling.
Thanksgiving is the following of that impulse.

- Henry Van Dyke

The miracle of gratitude is that it shifts your perception
to such an extent that it changes the world you see.
- Robert Holden

None is more impoverished than the one who has no gratitude.
Gratitude is a currency that we can mint for ourselves,
and spend without fear of bankruptcy.
- Fred De Witt Van Amburgh

Our opportunity is to Soar our Spirit.

To see Light and Joy in everything.
To spread our wings and fly boldly.
To give thanks for rainbows and butterflies -
our symbols of renewal and rebirth.
To offer daily Thanksgiving - for ourselves, our family,
our friends, our community, for the whole world.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: The Miracle of Gratitude

Give Thanks for the Commonplace

Appreciate Today

Gratitude for THIS Moment
   

Have a Thankful Heart

 

The unthankful heart... discovers no mercies;
but let the thankful heart sweep through the day and,
as the magnet finds the iron,
so it will find, in every hour,
some heavenly blessings!
- Henry Ward Beecher

When we trust in the natural goodness around us,
we open ourselves for the blessings of life to flow toward us.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

We return thanks to the Great Spirit,
in whom is embodied all goodness,
and who directs all things for the good of his children.
- Iroquois traditional

The roots of all goodness lie
in the soil of appreciation for goodness.
- Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama

Blessings flow toward gratitude.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Create the world that could be

Know that You have been Blessed

Believe in People; Believe in Yourself

The Power of Your Intention
    

Give Thanks for the Commonplace

The enlightened give thanks for what most people take for granted.
- Michael Beckwith

The invariable mark of wisdom is to
see the miraculous in the common.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

A thankful heart is the greatest virtue.
- Cicero

Today's affirmation:
I find joy and inspiration in the commonplace
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: The Commonplace

Simple Pleasures

Beauty is Everywhere
    

Give Thanks Daily

 

I thank you God for this most amazing day,
for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and for the blue dream of sky
and for everything which is natural,
which is infinite, which is yes.
- e. e. cummings

Thank you, God, for this good life
and forgive us if we do not love it enough.
- Garrison Keillor

Most people are more skilled at begging God than at thanking God.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Today's Affirmation:
I give thanks for the bounties of this world.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Gratitude for THIS Moment

Give Thanks and Celebrate

Thankful and Content

Give Thanks for the Commonplace
    

Thankfulness is a Virtue

 

A thankful heart is not only the greatest virtue,
but the parent of all other virtues.
- Cicero

If the only prayer you said in your whole life was,
Thank You, that would suffice.
- Meister Eckhart

However much or little you have,
"Thank You" is always a more powerful prayer than, "I need more."
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Whoever does not regard what he has
as most ample wealth, is unhappy,
though he be master of the world.
- Epictetus

God gave you a gift of 86,400 seconds today.
Have you used one to say "thank you?"
- William Arthur Ward

Further reading: The Power of Gratitude

Gratitude for Small Miracles

Zero-Based Gratitude

Unanswered Prayer
     

Make the Effort to See Familiar Things with New Eyes

 

Half the joy of life is in little things taken on the run...
but let us keep our hearts young and our eyes open
that nothing worth our while shall escape us.
- Victor Cherbuliez

Joy is what happens to us when we allow ourselves
to recognize how good things really are.
- Marianne Williamson

Look for joy in your life; it's not always easy to find.
- Charles Kuralt

Happiness often sneaks in through a door you didn't know you left open.
- John Barrymore

Often, the greatest joy is to be found not in new things,
but in old things seen through new eyes.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Life Lessons I Learned From My Cat

Is your glass of life half empty? Or half full?

Life is Beautiful

What we enjoy constitutes our abundance

How To Be Happy In Life
     

Count Your Blessings Every Day

 

Count your blessings - not your troubles.
- Dale Carnegie

In a society that has you counting money, pounds, calories, and steps,
be a rebel and count your blessings instead.
- Rev. Lisa Heckman

It is always a good day to be grateful for all of life -
grateful for large blessings and small.
Especially to be grateful for the symbolic blessings -
the rainbows and butterflies that come into our lives
when we least expect and most need them.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

If only the people who worry about their liabilities
would think about the riches they do possess,
they would stop worrying.
- Dale Carnegie

Further reading: Step Back, Gain Perspective

Beyond Worries

May You Be Blessed
    

Gratitude Brings Out the Bright Colors of Life

 

With gratitude, all life appears as a blessing -
without gratitude, all of life
is perceived as a burden.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

When you arise in the morning,
give thanks for the morning light, for your life and strength.
Give thanks for your food, and the joy of living.
If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies with yourself.
- Tecumseh

We tend to forget that happiness doesn't
come as a result of getting something we don't have,
but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have.
- Frederick Koenig

Gratitude Brings Out the Bright Colors of Life.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Giving Thanks for Our Food

What do you take for granted?

Celebrating the Small Miracles of Our Lives

My Glass of Life
    

We Can Never Understand Our World, But We Can Still Find Joy In It

 

As soon as man does not take his existence for granted,
but beholds it as something unfathomably mysterious,
thought begins.
- Albert Schweitzer

God is not what you imagine,
or what you think you understand.
If you understand you have failed.
- Saint Augustine

Be thankful that life is a mystery.
There is so much we can never know.
Breathe deeply and relax into the not-knowing.
There is much that we do not have to know in order to live joyfully.
We Can Never Understand Our World, But We Can Still Enjoy It.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

The world is incomprehensible.
We won't ever understand it;
we won't ever unravel its secrets.
Thus we must treat the world as it is:
a sheer mystery.
- Carlos Castaneda

Uncertainty that comes from knowledge
(knowing what you don't know)
is different from uncertainty coming from ignorance.
- Isaac Asimov

Further reading: Wonder and Mystery

Pause to Wonder

Cherish Mystery

Life: Mystery and Riddle
    

Appreciate What We DO Have

 

Is your glass of life
half empty?
Or half full?

Be Grateful for All of Life:
Each of us has been infinitely blessed - beginning with the gift of life.
Whatever may appear to be missing or broken on any particular day,
our glass is not half full, it is 99.9% full.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie - from 7 Secrets for a Happy Life

I don't think of all the misery,
but of the beauty that still remains.
- Anne Frank

We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures.
- Thornton Wilder

However much or little you have,
"Thank You" is always a more powerful prayer than, "I need more."
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Thank You God

Life Really Is Good

Appreciate Your Blessings

My Glass of Life
          

A Month of Giving Thanks 2024

Thanksgiving is my favorite American holiday, as being grateful for everything, especially for the gift of life itself, is at the top of my list of values. Will you join me in a celebration of Gratitude and Thanksgiving for the entire month of November?

Affirmation:
I commit the whole month of November to expressing gratitude and thanksgiving.

Suppose our gratitude could be zero-based gratitude.
With zero-based gratitude,
we would be grateful for everything we had each day -
regardless of whether it was more or less than yesterday.
With zero-based gratitude, I can be grateful for all the people,
the love, the food, the shelter, the services,
the health, that I am blessed with today,
regardless of what I had yesterday.
With zero-based gratitude,
I can be grateful each day for the gift of life itself.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie -- Read about Zero-Based Gratitude

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life.
It turns what we have into enough, and more.
It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity.
It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend.
Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.
- Melody Beattie

He who can give thanks for little
will always find he has enough.
- Anonymous

Gratitude bestows reverence, allowing us to encounter
everyday epiphanies, those transcendent moments of awe
that change forever how we experience life and the world.
- John Milton

Further reading: Know that You have been Blessed

Recognizing Our Abundance

The Truly Rich

Gratitude for THIS Moment

My Glass of Life