April's story; the power of gratitude; on thank-you notes
April should have been sitting with the other students instead of climbing up on my lap. But I'm glad she did, for she gave me a hug of such intense happiness. I can feel her thin arms around me now, even though this happened several years ago.
In her hand she clutched a purple ribbon stamped with the word "Participant" that all the youngsters in the school were given to celebrate Track and Field Day. A handful of the most athletic children received ribbons of red, yellow and blue. But to April, her ordinary ribbon was just perfect.
That day, this nine-year-old girl, who was mentally challenged and suffered from cerebral palsy, gave me a gift of striking simplicity. Her absolute joy taught me the power of appreciating what we have.
The power of gratitude
Feeling grateful moves the heart, but expressing gratitude ignites the soul. How often do we pause to say thank you. Once a day? Once a week? Where once we wrote thank-you notes by hand, we now fire off quick e-mails. Our runaway lives leave little time for these small gestures of grace and good manners.
And of course, it is a good idea to pause to thank our God. G. K. Chesterton, the prolific and enormously talented early-twentieth-century writer, once said, "You say grace before meals. All right. But I say grace before the concert and the opera; and grace before the play and pantomime; and grace before I open a book; and grace before sketching, painting and swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing; and grace before I dip the pen in ink."
Thank-you notes are nice
Sending a card to acknowledge a kindness is a simple but powerful act of gratitude. Think about picking up notecards in places you visit or making them with photographs you have taken. Here are a few occasions to adopt this considerate custom:
• After receiving a gift
• To acknowledge an overnight or weekend stay
• After a lunch or dinner held in your honour
• To recognize a special kindness
• Following a business interview
Click to continue to learn how to bypass greed and appreciate what you have...
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