Have you ever planned on doing something easy, only to complicate it? Of course you have, who hasn’t? As Charles Mingus said, “Anyone can make the simple complicated. Creativity is making the complicated simple.”
It’s Thanksgiving week, and I aimed to keep this write-up simple for myself by recycling an old post about thankfulness. Then I complicated things and decided I needed to do more. You know how it goes. But, let’s toast to simple! Here’s what I wrote:
For a long while, I enjoyed a blog at thxthxthx.com.* Leah Dieterich, the author, would write thanks yous to people (and things) just like her mom had taught her. She always addressed things directly as if the cat or the lamp she enjoyed would read her note. The gratitudes were like these I just wrote:
• Thanks open window, you invite birdsong into my kitchen, which is calming and beautiful
• Thanks past Timmy, you made me all this cold brew that I can enjoy this morning as I sit down and start my day.
• Thanks, glasses, you are so helpful when it’s time for me to drive to the store and buy groceries.
Gratitude in direct address has stuck with me ever since. It’s quirky and charming, and I like thanking things I enjoy and letting them know why I enjoy them, letting them know what they add to my life. It’s just so cool! (And goofy). Both of which appeal to me.
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That line ended the blog but I’m going to add a bit more, (complicating things).
Something I like about a daily gratitude practice besides it purportedly making a person happier is the creativity of finding new things to be grateful for. It makes me notice more of the world, in the same way looking for all the red things or blue things in a room makes me notice more. And of course, noticing things is one of the secrets of songwriting.
Enjoy!
*This link only points to a book collecting her thank you notes now.
The Prompt:
timmyr.com 
Love this Timmy. I agree it helps to see new things around us and look at what we could be grateful for and to. And keeping it quirky helps to avoid monotony. The power of gratitude is in feeling it, not in the listing of it.
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“The power of gratitude is in feeling it, not in the listing of it.” Such a good reminder. Gratitude practices can get to be monotonouse over time. It’s important to keep them fresh with the feeling of actually gratitude.
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