subtle shifts in perspective.
Gratitude isn't just a word, it's a way of being.
gratitude.
It’s just one word. One simple word.
Say it. Feel it in your body. Where does it tingle? What colors do you see? What sensations linger?
It’s more than just a word. It’s a feeling. It’s a way of being.
I sat in the driver’s seat of my Toyota Highlander, mindlessly holding the wheel steady between my hands as we sped down Highway 50, heading to the Montrose Regional Airport.
Adam sat to my right, the stereo between us blasting our hodgepodge of favorite songs.
Seventy miles of highway, leading me to a next big adventure.
My eyes darted between the cars in my rearview mirror and the glorious outline of snow-capped mountains in front of me. The expanse of beauty suddenly overwhelmed me: the high desert against the backdrop of mountains and mesas and colors of western Colorado.
It occurred to me how freaking grateful I am for my eyes.
Sure, I have to wear glasses and my sight has consistently been a struggle. Sure, there was a stretch of time when my eyes itched so bad from a new medication I was on that I thought I might rub them so hard they’d pop backwards into my skull.
But they didn’t and I have them. I can see from them. I can take in the world. I can see colors and nature and people’s expressions and words on the page and road signs and the expanse of the ocean and the laugh lines of my own face.
My eyes dampened and I blinked back tears.
I had this moment of pure expansion—no matter what happens in my life, no matter what highs and lows come along, can’t I just be grateful for sight? To enjoy a sunrise and sunset? To look into the eyes of someone I love? Does anything else even matter?
No, of course. And life always figures itself out.
How often do we take our blessings for granted?
I was laying with my legs up the wall in my bedroom, listening to a guided meditation.
In it, the voice walked me through a heart-opening exercise. It ended with me placing my hands on my chest, over my heart area.
For the first time in a while, or possibly ever, I literally just felt my heart beating.
My body exploded with awe.
What a fucking miracle that this muscle, this muscle that is no bigger than my fist, is just constantly pumping, constantly working on its own. That it hasn’t stopped for twenty-nine years. Not for one minute has it taken a break. It’s just inside me, always. Keeping the drumbeat of my life.
Thank you, I love you, I whispered.
My friend Alex sent me a voice note a week after taking one of my SoulFlow™ embodiment classes. In it, she reflected on the colors that came to her in the practice and the breadcrumbs that she followed to the message.
She told me that the message was around roosters.
The first was from a card she pulled with the image of a rooster. The message she received said that while the rest of the world is running around like chickens with their heads cut off, lost in the shuffle and stress of each day, the rooster is meant to remind people of the light that comes with each new day.
And then a podcast she was listening to talked about how somewhere in Florida, roosters and chickens living around a new resort were relocated because they might disturb the vacationers.
And she shared this reframe with me:
how can we see the things that bother us differently? the rooster doesn’t have to be a nuisance. it doesn’t have to just be something that disturbs the stillness of the morning.
Instead, we can choose to see it as a beautiful blessing that reminds us that we are alive.
That we get to bear witness to a new day.
A perspective shift. A reframe.
I meet up with a old friend. Their response to “How’s it going?” has always been, “Living the dream.”
But they have a new mantra now.
And it’s, “I’m just grateful I woke up on the right side of the ground.”
Don’t let “bad” seconds, moments, hours, days, weeks trick you into thinking you have a bad life.
There are always little jewels to be found in each day—even if it’s just waking up above the ground instead of below it, even if it’s just seeing five feet in front of you, even if it’s just feeling that consistent life force in your chest, even if it’s smiling at the sound of a rooster instead of recoiling.
Those are the things that make your life.
Be grateful for them.
I’m grateful I can see these words to write them, my heart beating steadily as I do so.
And I’m so grateful that your eyes are seeing them, too (or that your ears are listening to them).
What a gift.
xx
Court