Much like every other Thanksgiving of my life, I was at church this morning with my family. It was a kind of weird experience only because this was the first Thanksgiving mass where I wasn’t part of the music ministry because my very dear music director at that particular parish retired at the beginning of October. However, not to be one who fights change, I decided to give my contact info to the new director and offer my services and help for Christmas; we’ll see how that goes.
The homily was what caught my attention today, as our parish priest talked about (surprise, surprise) being thankful. However, he took a very different approach to it as he began. He talked about how easy it is to be negative, and how deceivingly pervasive it can be. Rather than embracing a new day, many people are negative about their mindset throughout their day. And don’t think that I’m soapboxing here, because I can be just as negative as the next person unfortunately.
What’s funny about it is that some people just assume that I am, and always will be, a very negative person. I’ve discussed this with friends of mine, and pointed out to them that, as negative as I can be, it’s mostly in the short-term. And, in a gut reaction, yes my mindset will probably be negative (or bitingly sarcastic, the two aren’t mutually exclusive), but, in the grand scheme of things, I always seem to maintain a relatively healthy, positive mindset (I am a Cubs fan after all :-D). I think the one thing that we can all do is to approach our negativity and not let it 1) overwhelm us and 2) pervade the attitudes of others.
When we get up in the morning, don’t think about how awful the day is going to be, but see it in terms of its potential to be great, and just the fact that waking up to a new day in and of itself is a blessing. The title of this post is from a George Strait song entitled “I Saw God Today”, and I realized today that it has a lot of personal significance, because, as the lyrics say, I don’t look as often as I should. So, on this wonderful holiday where we are thankful for all of the great things in our lives, learn to embrace the difficulties, as I leave you with these few lines from “I Saw God Today”.
I’ve been to church
I’ve read the book
I know He’s here
But I don’t look
Near as often as I should
Yeah, I know I should
His fingerprints are everywhere
I just slowed down to stop and stare
Opened my eyes and man I swear
I saw God today
Happy Thanksgiving!
Best,
MJH