Thankful

I am feeling thankful. I didn’t even know that one can feel thankful. I always thought that being thankful is a fleeting state of mind. I wasn’t aware that it is something that can permeate your whole being and just settle. Like something that has found a comfortable spot and decided to linger.

But I was wrong. Because it can linger. It will stay as long as you let it. Filling up your heart with a swelling amount of gratitude each day until you feel like you can burst open with it.

It’s such a new feeling for me. You see, I have rarely been thankful. I was always concentrated on worrying, on controlling, on being afraid, on being scared - that gratitude couldn’t find a place to set its beautiful essence on. I could always spot what is wrong from tens of miles away. And worse, I could imagine a million and one ways things will go wrong before it can even start. And soon enough, I have a horror film playing in my mind fed by my very fertile sense of doom.

But since I started to open up and slowly release my fears, I could finally see beyond the clouds. The little things that I have taken for granted suddenly glistened in front of me. And little by little, gratitude entered. Now, I am just grateful for everything – the fact that I now have a deeper connection with my daughter, the presence of friends and loved ones around me who genuinely care, the roof above my head, my new job that fulfils me and let my creativity shine, a boss who guides me, values my work and recognizes my potential, colleagues who are very supportive. The list is long and my life replete.

It is such a liberation. When you enter this state, everything suddenly just falls into place. And you CAN expect the unexpected because things start to unfold right before your eyes with nary an effort. And suddenly, even the bad things that have happened in your life are seen in a different light. You see it as a blessing rather than a curse. And you are thankful that even those things happened.

However, there is one thing that I feel most grateful for. Far more than the things, people and circumstances surrounding me at the moment. Over and above everything, I am grateful to be myself. I am thankful that I didn’t buckle down under the weight of it all. I am thankful that I was courageous enough to plod on despite how stormy the journey was that most times, I couldn’t even see where I was going. I am thankful for the resiliency of my spirit. I am thankful for my faith. I am thankful that my heart was cushioned in hope, that no matter how dark the skies, I never doubted the presence of the sun.

And I am thankful to be in this state of gratitude because finally, I can love myself. I see my worth and what I am capable of. It’s funny how good things feed on good things. When you let yourself grow and just let yourself be filled up with good feelings, it just feeds on itself. And all the things that you thought could never be yours such as happiness, peace and love all start to appear – those things that every single person on this God-given earth looks for but we all think are very hard to achieve.

As I said in my previous post, I have a big love for words. It is of no surprise then, that at this moment of deep gratitude, I have found a poem that speaks perfectly of how I feel and has moved my spirit once more.

INVICTUS

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced or cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged the punishments the scroll.
I am the master of my fate.
I am the captain of my soul.

- William Ernest Henley