I’m Talking ‘Bout Gratitude

Gratitude.

Particularly this time of year, you hear the word ‘gratitude’ often. We all use it, advertisers and us regular folk alike – and we mean it, really we do. Yet, like so often happens, words can get diluted and lose some of their meaning. Or they are spoken out of, dare I say, habit.

And I do have so much to be grateful for – the list is embarrassing long.  The usual suspects are family and friends, health and wealth,  happiness and good fortune.  But there were a couple of things that recently popped up in my life which I hadn’t considered. One is my car, the other is the money I carry in my wallet.

Suze Orman is not a favorite of mine, but I have always appreciated her message and I do believe she helps many people in financial difficulties.  She has a new series called Money Class which is airing sometime in January and I caught the introduction to the series on PBS last week.   One thing she said really struck me.

Suze believes that if you stuff your bills haphazardly into your wallet, purse or pocket, you are disrespecting your money.  I never paid much attention to how I carry my money, and I admit to having a bit of a mess going on in my wallet.

So I have now decided to keep my bills arranged neatly and to be more organized with my cash, showing more respect and gratitude for the bills which are merely symbols of my wealth. (I’m not wealthy by most standards, but I like to think of myself, and to use the word ‘wealthy’ when thinking about myself – you should try it!)

Like my wallet, my car is usually a bit of a mess. She’s thirteen years old, a baby really, but she suffers from cosmetic neglect. No excuses, and no real reason, I’ve just always been hard on all my cars.  So when I brought my car in for an oil change recently, and the repair guy, Sean, tried to sell me on a bunch of services he felt I needed, ($250 total)  I said no thanks, not now. When he pressed, and suggested maybe just doing one of the services ($90) I said, “This really is just a piece of shit car – and probably not worth the investment.” (I’m ashamed even just typing that) To which he replied – “I’ll take that POS car.”

I felt lots of different things, but mainly shame. I was showing a complete lack of respect for my faithful Camry friend by dismissing all the years of service she’s given me. But most of my shame came from not being sensitive to another person’s needs.  To this young car repair guy, perhaps this would be the best car he’d ever owned. Or maybe, he doesn’t even have a car and uses mass transit or rides a bike to work like so many do – not for the exercise, but out of necessity.

Sean’s comment was a real eye-opener and taught me several lessons;  gratitude, compassion, respect, pride of ownership… the list is embarrassingly long.

Grateful for the photo by KB35