It's THAT time of year again π.... to create your grocery AND gratitude lists
Happy Thanking! π
FINDING JOY: The ThanksGiving List
Over a decade ago I started my favorite tradition ever: The ThanksGiving List. It is a list of my closest friends and why I am thankful for them that year. It's specific and heartfelt and I work on it the weekend before Thanksgiving (or earlier) and it is the best thing I do all year....
I was once in a seminar where the guy leading it, we'll call him Tom, was sharing how he came to be speaking in front of us. He spoke of the things he had screwed up in his life and how he found his path to the life he is currently living. The one story that really stuck with me is how on his quest to start a more authentic life he went back to repair his relationship with his ex-wife. He said her only question was: why did things end the way they did?
His blunt answer was: I had made such a mess of things they didn't seem fixable so it was just easier to walk away.
Not that he had stopped loving her, not that there was someone else- just that the mess seemed overwhelming to him so he ignored it and tried to be a better person without ever looking back.
I thought of that story recently after seeing two movies - Juliet, Naked and A Star is Born- with characters who wanted to do the same thing: walk away. Close a chapter in their past and just try and start a new one.
Not going to give away any endings but suffice it to say, it's harder to walk away from our lives then it is to just simply clean them up. Maybe not during to messiest of parts (clean-up sucks!) but for us to have a happy ending for sure.
We are the authors of our lives and when one of the chapters of it goes awry we get to declare there is another chapter still to be written. It might be messy. It might need editing. But until we're dead, we have infinite options for rewrites & alternate endings.
re·write
verb . /rΔΛrΔ«t/
write (something) again so as to alter or improve it.
What is known by screenwriters- and romantics- is that the ultimate ending is not coasting to an inevitably smooth landing or a quick ride off into the sunset... it is the road to redemption. It's harder, and hillier, and a heck of a lot easier to quit on. But the road to redemption's where things get acknowledged and repaired and fought for-- it is the option few but the strongest attempt. And it brings epic endings!
Bill Cosby might not be morally (or even mentally) up for it but he could admit his sins/crimes and take this opportunity to champion prison reform and correctional education. For decades he was America's father and he's not going to ever get back there- but he could spend the remainder of his life in service being a better person or waste it being a bitter one. A really tragic ending for all involved!
The politicians that are currently using these political divides in our country to make a career and/or a profit could spend their days granted to them in office taking what they can get and go down in history -if at all- being enablers of these times. Or they can spend them bringing our country together, finding bi-partisan agreement, and putting country before party. True Patriotism! πΊπΈ
Tom's ex forgave him for the hurt he inflicted into their marriage and they are both happily re-married, but she did say: it would have been great if you could have worked on yourself while I was there trying to get you to- it really would have been nice if we could have had our own happy ending. π₯Ί
The hero's journey needs conflict to be overcome to allow for the story to be inspiring. It's part of the journey and only thing to be ashamed of is leaving our mess in someone else's path.
π€Are we living as the hero in our own story? Are we the villain in someone else's? Are there messes to be cleaned up? Rewrites to be written?
How do we get to our happily-ever-after?
Yours to say... ✍️
