Gratitude

Yesterday, on my hike, I was awed by my circumstances.

I had gotten up early to work on my novel, worked out, made progress on a project, and then went outside into the amazing Swiss beauty. I recorded eloquent, clever, exciting snippets for a talk I'm giving tomorrow on my newly downloaded voice recorder app as I walked up the side of a mountain. I felt strong, inspired, successful, and blessed...

...and I was so, so, so grateful.

Then my mind started racing through just exactly how grateful I was and how best to articulate it and whether it would be better to take a picture of the mountains, or the trail, or the forest, or just a selfie so that I could put it on Instagram. I was so happy and grateful in that moment and I wanted to share it with the world, or at least my  followers.

But wait, I thought… wouldn’t that be bragging? I mean, I truly AM grateful, but would I be able to bring that across convincingly without it looking like just another Hey-everybody-I'm-amazing-but-I-added-#Blessed-so-this-is-still-really-humble post?

And then another thought entered my brain: How about trying to be actually grateful, not just Instagram grateful?

And another one: How about trying to be actually present in situation for which you’re grateful – to experience it and relish it and soak it in – instead of scrambling to figure out how you can capture it and communicate it? How about just enjoying it?

So I did. And I will. Or at least I’ll try.

#Blessed