Gratitude

I don't know exactly how to explain this part of myself, and maybe if you know me well you will understand what I mean.  I am plagued with guilt.  I see unfairness in the world and it interprets into guilt to me.  Why do I deserve to be so fortunate when innumerable others are suffering?  Many work harder for less and are happier with less.  My most common phrase is probably "I'm sorry".  And I really am.  I liken it to the cursed little girl in Eragon named Elva.  She feels the pain everyone around her will go through and therefore does everything in her power to prevent them from being hurt.  Only I don't have what it takes to prevent the pain.  So instead I feel guilt.

I know guilt is not a productive emotion, so I'm trying to change it to gratitude.  I have much to be grateful for.  I am grateful that I live in a country that makes life so easy on me.  I am grateful for my health.  I am grateful for Alex, and my family and friends, and that I have loving parents who were concerned about how I was raised.  I am grateful that education was accessible to me so that I was able to graduate college and get a good job, and I understand that there are many people out there who are smarter and harder working that just didn't have the opportunities that I had.  I am grateful for my relative intelligence.  That too, is luck.  I respect those who may not be as smart, for to those, life can be more of a struggle.  I am grateful that my troubles are trivial.

And I understand how fragile all this is.

Book Lovin'

I've been reading A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, by Betty Smith.  I loved this dialogue so much I just had to share it.  I'm not very far into the book, by the way, but already it is amazing.

This is a conversation between Francie's mother, Katie, and her grandmother, Mary.  They are discussing how to raise Francie shortly after her birth.


"Mother, I know there are no ghosts or fairies.  I would be teaching the child foolish lies."

Mary spoke sharply.  "You do not know whether there are not ghosts on earth or angels in heaven."

"I know there is no Santa Claus."

"Yet you must teach the child these things are so."

"Why?  When I, myself, do not believe?"

"Because," explained Mary Rommely simply, "the child must have a valuable thing which is called imagination.  The child must have a secret world in which live things that never were.  It is necessary that she believe.  She must start out by believing in things not of this world.  Then when the world becomes too ugly for living in, the child can reach back and live in her imagination.  I, myself, even in this day and at my age, have great need of recalling the miraculous lives of the Saints and the great miracles that have come to pass on earth.  Only by having these things in my mind can I live beyond what I have to live for."

"The child will grow up and find out things for herself.  She will know that I lied.  She will be disappointed."

"That is what is called learning the truth.  It is a good thing to learn the truth one's self.  To first believe with all your heart, then not to believe, is good too.  It fattens the emotions and makes them to stretch.  When as a woman life and people disappoint her, she will have had practice in disappointment and it will not come so hard.  In teaching your child, do not forget that suffering is good too.  It makes a person rich in character."



Ah, beautiful.