I don’t know who James Clear is, but the words force yourself jumped out at me this morning. Finding a gratitude topic that resonates enough to make me want to write about it, and then an appropriate corresponding image to go with it, has been an important part of my early morning regimen for months now. The practice steers my general focus, so if I haven’t awakened particularly grateful, I soon am. Along the way I’ve discovered that I can’t be grateful and hateful at the same time. You see, I am working on forgiving someone I thought I hated because of the tremendous pain he has and is inflicting on people I love.
I’m only on the third day of forcing myself to do what the Big Book of AA suggests as a way of dealing with resentments, and that’s to pray for this person’s happiness and prosperity. I’m grateful for the caveat of not having to be sincere, because at this point I’m not. But I sense my hard facade cracking.
I’m grateful for sobriety because now I have no excuses for harboring ill will. Now I realize it’s a mental choice, not the emotional reaction I thought I was entitled to.
I’m grateful for the lightness in my heart that I’m sensing. I’m grateful for finally understanding that mentally and emotionally sick people, such as the one in my life, are exactly the people that Jesus said to love.
So, it’s probably a good idea to force myself to practice what Jesus preached because good begets good. And there can never be too much of that.
Choose my instruction instead of silver, knowledge rather than choice gold, ~Proverbs 8:10
