I have sat down multiple times to write about gratitude. As I embark upon leaping into business and dream building with my husband, it feels especially important to start with thanks. Even though my thoughts have been on gratitude a great deal lately, I have found myself at a loss of words every time I have sat down to write.
Gratitude is vast. It is a feeling. It is action. It is a lens of perception. It is a way of living.
And I haven’t been able to capture that all in words.
Last week while trying to write and being stuck again, I ended up putting those feelings of gratitude into action. I re-made the community altar and lit my home/temple up with prayer. I took every item off the altar. I cleaned the wood with Florida water made by a beloved friend and healer. I dusted and cleaned all the items from the altar as I prepared to make an altar of gratitude.
The first items on the altar were the various offering bowls, places to give offerings of gratitude. I then placed each of the Goddess and God statues and items thanking each one for their presence in my life. With the candle holders and stones in place, I started bringing in the community part of the altar. With each item placed, I said a prayer of thanks for the person who gave that item. I placed every one (of the many) objects with all of my intention and attention. I saw the altar grow in love and light and thankfulness.
After lighting candles and giving thanks to Spirits and ancestors, I came back to this altar. I brought fruit and money to place in the offering bowls as tokens of my gratitude. And then I looked in the big bowl. It was big and it was empty. So, I wrote a note about something I was grateful for and put it in the bowl. My daughter wrote one too. Then I wrote four more. And she wrote more. The bowl was not empty any more and it felt like a wonderful way to express our gratitude while turning the altar into a place of interaction that will continue to grow. It felt perfectly symbolic of gratitude in how as gratitude grows it creates more reasons to be grateful.
Now I begin in gratitude. I am grateful for everything that has brought me to this moment and to this leap.
Thanks to Divine presence in my life. Thanks to the many Spirits and deities that guide me, teach me, and help bring me back to my center of love of strength and remind me of my gifts.
Thanks to my ancestors whose blood and stories and love have shaped and created me.
Thanks to the many teachers, in their many forms, that I have known and will know in my life. Thank you to the human teachers and spiritual mentors and teachers. Thanks to the animal and plant teachers. Thanks to the teachers in the seas and skies and rocks and lands.
Thanks for my friends, for my beloveds, for my communities. Where would I be without the reflection, the acceptance, the love and support? I am blessed and overflowing with gratitude.
Thanks for the privilege and honor I have had to travel and connect with people to share healing knowledge, music, ritual, celebration, and community.
Thanks for the challenges and losses I have experienced. They have made me exactly who I am and taught me much on pain, grief, and compassion and healing.
Thanks to my beloved husband Keiden – for being open, for not running away the bazillion times it got sooo intense, and for taking the leap with me in so many ways. I am thankful for the life we are building and all we are creating.
Oceans of gratitude for my daughter. I have learned more about love and strength from her than I knew possible. I bow to the sacred relationship of mother and daughter and give so many thanks that she and I ended up together for this ride.
Thanks for the abundant blessings and prosperity in my life.
In thanks, I step onto this path of bringing my dreams and the dreams shared with my beloved to life.
Ready. Steady. LEAP!