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Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Working Mom Wednesday

Linking to awesome working mom blogger Julia @ Work, Wife, Mom, Life, this week I'm making my own prompt - Gratitude

I recently read a Reader's Digest story about a lawyer who's law firm was bleeding money, he was being sued, going through a difficult divorce and had become distanced from his kids. He became so stressed that he found himself walking out into traffic without looking first, wondering if it might it might be easier to just end life. All this after 23 years of work. It made me think about work - I've got 10 professional years under my belt, if in 13 years from now I was going through this mess I'd be really upset! In life we want to progress NOT face calamity this late in our career!

The story went on to say this man was so frustrated that one day he walked 15 miles until he heard a voice that said,
"Until you learn to be grateful for the things you have, you will not receive the things you want".
He then got the idea to write thank you cards as a way to improve his gratitude. It started with a card to his son for the single cup coffee maker Christmas present, he thanked people for repaying loans, he thanked his apartment manager for working so hard to fix a leaky toilet, he thanked the cat adoption agency for taking such good care of the cat he adopted and finally he wrote a thank you letter to his young daughter.
"Thank you for being so cheerful and happy when I picked you up yesterday. Sometimes I don't have a very fun day, but when I see you and we talk about things and have fun, I feel better. Thank you for being the best daughter ever."
He wrote 50 cards in all that year and it changed his life. He started paying attention when crossing the street and realized life was worth living.

I know many of us do not face the kind of trials this man faced but I loved the concept of writing thank you cards and how it can improve our gratitude. Recently I took my car to Goodyear to get the front tire fixed; it was really low and I suspected a flat was coming. They spent an entire hour taking the tire off, soaking the rubber and couldn't find a hole. I spent this time at Dunkin' Donuts taking a well needed break, watching the old people treat it like their local Starbucks. It was so nice to take a break. When I went back to get the car, the guy didn't charge me! I think he deserves my first thank you card of the year!

5 comments:

Unpolished Parenting said...

I really like that Thank You note idea. I have intentions to do them from time to time and then just don't. Beautfiul quote and reminder.

Unknown said...

What a wonderful post. I love me some good quotes so I am totally stealing "Until you learn to be grateful for the things you have you will not receive the things you want"
Thank You!!

Julia Ladewski said...

wow!! that was so nice of him! and as a program director of a business, it's so nice to get thank you's and be recognized for a job/service well done!

what a great post, Rachel!!

crazywildberry said...

I love writing thank you letters. They are time consuming, but they help me to remember who things came from. There are many wedding gifts from almost 13 years ago that I can remember who gave us what. But, I don't write them as often as I should. So, good reminder! Plus, who doesn't LOVE to get personal snail mail these days?

Mamma Kerr said...

I LOVE this post! I honestly do agree that you do have to take time to be thankful for all the little things - they all add up!

I'm forever reminding my daughters how lucky they are too - for having a twin sister, parents, grandparents, aunties & uncles who love them, a nice house, friends, pets, LOTS of toys, the list goes on...

I'm a member of Send Out Cards, and our ethos is to act daily on our promptings - to send at least one heartfelt greeting card a day to someone we know or have just met. It could be to say Thank You, Happy Birthday, Well Done, Missing You, Thinking About You, Good Luck - ANYTHING!! It's a great habit to get into!...

:)

Annette (aka Mamma Kerr)
www.soclink.com/annettekerr