With Deep Gratitude

I am so incredibly grateful.

First and foremost to wake up to a life that I decided for myself. That I chose, that I created through decisions aligned with my vision. For a job that allows me to have a week off at a time to recooperate and explore, the fact that I can financially support myself with this schedule and dont need another form of income. 

I am grateful for the feeling of being alive. Something I take for granted every single day in most of the moments I have it. Life is such a blessing. The pain and sorrow and suffering have become an avenue to an even more beautiful and enriched, fulfilling experience. Without the natural and inevitable valleys I would not appreciate the stunning shining peaks. And I am grateful for that.

I am grateful for my learned ability to release the resistance that leads to unnecessary suffering. I have learned that suffering is inevitable. Pain will come to grant me it’s company because it is a vital and integral and natural part of life, yet I can choose how it impacts me from the moment I have a thought about it. 

In line with that I am grateful for my awareness. My ability to notice my thoughts (as often as I can), to catch myself in a spiral or in some unnecessary anxiety and fear that I am causing myself through overthinking, and to reconnect with the present moment.

I am grateful for my practices that allow me to connect to the present moment. The ability to ground myself in my body through subtle as well as extremely intentional meditative moments. Through yoga and visualization. Through reparenting and choosing the dialogue that goes on in my own mind. Through gratitude as well, the power and peace it brings my body, truly feeling it consume me when I allow my mind to focus on it and become the bright shining, loving being I know I am at my core.

Grateful for every day I’ve had, every day I will, and most importantly, this special moment right here. Noticed and loved and made by me.

________________

Wow. There are so many incredible things to be grateful for in my life. And to think, it all started this week with leaving my journal behind. I didn’t have my journal for my off shift. It gives me security, safety, a place to put all my thoughts and I was afraid to be without it. But the beauty I created from that fear and pain instead of the wallowing and suffering from it was incredible. 

I found alternative avenues to my normative and comfortable experience. I was able to sit and think about my problems and allow them to fly through my brain, uninterrupted by attempting to write them out. I talked to my partner more about how I was feeling instead of keeping it in writing. We discussed problems and solutions and I felt connected to him. I recognized my deep attachment I have to my journals and felt grateful for all the experiences I have been able to express in them. I even went back and looked at old journal entries. As they brought tears to my eyes I felt immense pride and deep love for that past version of me who was learning so much and was still so afraid and suffering. I cried for the insights of wisdom, sparks of joy, deep wounds, and big dreams she allowed herself to have in the safety of those pages. I grew through this uncomfortable experience of not having my ‘comfort item’ and finding alternative ways to express myself and cope.

I experienced gratitude through my pain. And I will never forget it. Another lesson I am taking with me into the next day and hopefully the one after that. So here I am today to share it with whoever finds it in their path :)

With my deep, bottomless, unending and loving gratitude,

Paige