What are you thankful for? When you take a look at your life, what kinds of things are on your Blessings List? 

Today is November 1st, and we are making our way to the Thanksgiving holiday, here in the United States. In a few weeks, many of us may be sitting down to a Thanksgiving meal and sharing what we are thankful for with family and friends.

That image got me thinking about thankfulness. I’m sure, like many of you, I am not only blessed at Thanksgiving, but I am blessed each day of my life.

In fact, right now I am sitting outside in the sunshine, listening to my hubby and Little Bit as they are in full belly laughs around the corner of the house. I’m telling you, THAT is going on my Blessings List. 

And, this weather! For days it has been 50 degrees, dark, and rainy. Today it is 70 degrees, there are zero clouds, AND I am wearing shorts! On November 1st? Adding that to my list. Wait! I can’t believe this, a butterfly just zoomed by, in November! Better add that one, too.

So, what is a Blessings List? It is something I totally made up. It is simply a list to keep track of things we are grateful for.

Whatever for? Well, everyone has probably heard that one way to be happy is to be grateful. Though, at times, that is easier said, than done.

Sometimes life is hard. Sometimes life is messy. People we love get sick. We may not be happy in our jobs. Money may be short. We might lose our loved ones. We may have health issues.

I consider myself reasonably healthy. I take pretty good care of myself. Recently, I had a  huge health scare and the doctors were talking about some really alarming possibilities. We were scared.

A week later, we got my test results. They were all NEGATIVE! Hallelujah. My goodness, we were so grateful it wasn’t anything life threatening.

Even before my hospital stay, I considered myself a “blessing-counter”. I always try to give thanks, show gratitude, and not take things for granted. But, I was taking one thing for granted: time.

I love to write. But, writing always got shoved to the back of my priority list. While swimming in a sea of unanswered questions at the hospital, I decided when I got home, I’d start a blog. 

Me! Me?? What?? That can’t be right. I’d told my friend a month before that, that I’d never have a blog. Too scared to try it. Put my writing into the world? Yikes. It’s safer in a notebook where no one sees it.

But, I did it. It has been three weeks since I started blogging and what an incredible blessing it has been.

The lesson for me was, blessings show up when we aren’t even looking for them. Who would ever think a hospital stay could be a blessing? It was. It put me here, writing.

Even if life gets hard, let’s try to look for gratefulness anyway. Sometimes finding even one sliver of thankfulness is enough to fill pages of blessings.