On Recipes

What does it mean to be “grateful” or to have a posture of “gratitude”?

I often find myself seeking to understand the “what” and the “why” when good things and challenging things happen in life; I want to understand the “recipe.”

I’ve discovered that seeking to understand the recipe, especially for gratitude, distracts and detracts from being grateful.

It is akin to trying to pay for a gift that has been given.

It’s like chewing delicious food so many times it starts to taste bad.

Understanding the “what” and “why” definitely has its place–especially in learning from mistakes and challenging times so as not to repeat those.

But doing this with gratitude often undermines it.

Sometimes, the best–maybe only–thing that can be said is simply, “Thank you!”

I had this happen to me a handful of times recently where I could not understand what people, but especially God, had done, and rather than simply saying, “Thank you,” I diminished it by trying to understand the “recipe.”

The lessons learned from this: Live in the moment. Enjoy the taste, and don’t worry about the recipe. Accept what is given. Be humble. Be grateful.

Say, “Thank you!”

How about you? How do you express gratitude–both internally and externally?

The bottom-line: let’s express gratitude without having to understand the recipe!