Gratitude for "What Is"

Thanksgiving kicks off a season of giving thanks for our various blessings. The Christmas season continues the season of gratitude and adds reconciliation and giving to the mix. New Year’s is a time for pushing off into the next year with fresh insight, thoughts and behaviors.

As we are midway through this year’s journey through the holidays, today we are talking about reconciliation and gratitude. Simply defined, reconciliation means bringing together, compromise (letting go of the “shoulds” in our heads, e.g. I should look like this, I should do that), and reunion (finding our way back to a mindful path).

Each year, we all go through some sort of reconciliation process with ourselves. We try to find our way back to a peaceful place or enter into a new one. At a basic level, we all want to increase peace and decrease suffering. During the holidays, we are often focused on giving to loved ones and individuals in need. We are maybe worried about not being able to give enough. Maybe we are worried about just taking care of things for our families. In any case, we yearn for a reconciling of our lives. We yearn for a place in which things all line up to help us be at peace in our minds.

The thing is, we already have on board what is required to achieve this, regardless of our circumstances. Reconciling with oneself requires a willingness and effort to look within and bring all parts of ourselves, including those that are not working, together in a synergistic motion towards change.

Simply defined, gratitude means thankfulness or appreciation. This focus alone can change lives. Simply shifting your focus in any moment to what you are grateful for brings fresh energy and decreases the focus on what is lacking. Applying this to our lives in a general way can improve mood and overall outlook on life.

Applying this to our views on our bodies can reduce anxiety and make us more effective in engaging in the health behaviors necessary to be happy in our own skin. Gratitude means a focus on appreciating what is. Period.

“More focused on controlling it than how my body was working”.

When we are more focused on controlling our bodies than meeting them where they are (gratitude and acknowledgment of a change that may be needed to be healthy), we lose the appreciation for its uniqueness and for what it does for us every day.

“Letting go…Be more ok with “what is”…rather than “wanting”.

Recently a blogger  initiated an effort in gratitude to our bodies, and it’s become it’s own movement I view this as a direct response to the “perfected” (enhanced) images displayed in media that individuals (women, men, and children) are constantly digesting. This movement is leading us in taking a firm stand in recognition that our bodies are not just images, but the vehicles that carry us through our life journey. Damn straight we should be grateful, this is no small feat!

“If I’m on my death bed, what does it matter if I weight 5 lbs more”.

As we have seen in previous blogs severe consequences can occur from extreme pursuits of “ideal” body sizes and shapes. So, why are we fixated on the “should” images? We make efforts to get our heads “straight” only to have them spun around by an image we see while driving in our cars, watching television, or reading seemingly harmless media. The bottom line is that we need to meet our body half way. Appreciate what we’ve got and work on things that move us towards physical and mental health.

“What does your body do for you, as a tool, how does it help you enjoy life?

Take a moment and imagine your body. What parts come to mind first? As the parts of your body come into your mind’s eye, think of one reason you are grateful for that part. Tip: focus on function, and not appearance.

This isn’t about turning something negative into positive, e.g. a “bad” thought, into a