The Return to the Small Things.
THE STORY – Of gratitude & the appreciation of life despite it all, or maybe because of it all.
With THE STORY I’m sharing words from my soul, stories from my life, and the myth of my experience. This time I’m sharing my journey from believing that gratitude could only come in moments of complete comfort, to finding it in the beauty of imperfection.
My hand is shaking a little bit as I light the candle. I had a cappuccino earlier, caffeinated, for the first time in a while. Sometimes I break my own rules. Today is one of these days.
My caffeine-shaky fingers adjust the new candle on the little green plate on my desk, and I watch the flame shiver in the cold of my office. The tea to my right is steaming into a herbal cloud dancing beside my screen, and I am grateful for the heated blanket I sit on, mustard golden, with a satin feel to it.
I am grateful.
For the peppermint tea in the way-too-big mug that I love so much. For the stack of beeswax candles that gets replenished by my dad every Christmas. For my cat sitting next to me, and for her sweet, ever so disappointed sounding meow that lets me know she’d rather I pay attention to her than write.
Once upon a time I thought gratitude belongs to moments of pure comfort. Moments without doubt, and pain, and questions. I thought that contentment, joy and happiness were only truly accessible when all discomfort had faded away.
Oh boy, I was so wrong.
My head is whispering of an oncoming migraine. That’s why I didn’t choose decaf at the café earlier – sometimes the caffeine helps. Sometimes it makes it worse. It’s a gamble. My fingers and toes are still stiff and cold, and the faint yet clearly noticeable cramping in my belly tells me that I’ll be bleeding soon – marking the 4 year anniversary of trying to fall pregnant with yet another sigh: not this time.
I am grateful.
I don’t need to play mind games any more to trick myself into gratitude. I don’t need to tell myself any longer that others have it worse than I do, sneaking in comparison after comparison, to stop my thoughts from dancing around the negative. That, I am grateful for.
I don’t know when it shifted. I don’t know when the moment came that allowed me to sit in stillness, sit with that imperfect body, those many unanswered questions and challenges, and truly feel in every cell of my being that gratitude is untouched by the little niggles, and the big hurdles. That gratitude lives, in fact, in every atom of my existence. In every muscle that aches, and every shivering toe, just as much as it lives in the warmth radiating through my back, and the smile that plays on my lips when I watch my cat trying to catch her own tail.
I don’t know when I realised that I had access to that inner well of love and appreciation for life, despite it all, or maybe, because of it all.
I pick up my journal. Last year, I wrote an intuitive note to myself for each month of 2024. I find the words for September:
“Gratitude. Appreciating all of life, the magic in the mundane. Be fully awake, without expectations of what should be. Be in awe of the present. Savour the las drop of life’s offerings. Unconditional awe. Something is blossoming deep within that requires my attention. Listen to the pulse of the Earth’s heart and learn from her wisdom. Reconnect with Earth, go out into Nature!
September is your month. What a lovely month to love! That is the invitation: love, love and love some more. It’s literally all about that. Love life, this moment. Feel the gratitude radiate inside of you. Celebrate that you are alive! This is magnificent, perfect and beautiful. How far you have come! Cheers to you! Let yourself be loved.”
I smile.
Life’s magic at my fingertips, I close the journal and my eyes. Breathing. Deeply.
I am grateful.
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