During the past week, I have been particularly mindful of the many gifts I have received from the Buddhist monk, Thich Nhat Hanh. I knew that his health was failing, but I didn’t actually focus on his dying. His passing on January 22, 2022 has prompted me to recall all of the gifts I have received  from him as a result of the way he dedicated his life to living in a compassionate, mindful way.

As I talked with friends about his passing, one reminded all of his of a daily blessing he said each morning. We requested her to send to us, and I have now framed it and put it on my bedside table – see above photo.

When we take the time to tune into all that we have to be grateful for, we realize that we so easily overlook all of the magnificent gifts we are given each day. I am making it a daily practice each morning to read and say aloud Hanh’s blessing, On Waking. I hope that as I embed this practice in my life each day, I will be more mindful of the gift of life. To realize each morning that we have been given another day of life is indeed a gift, and one that I hope will remind me to live the next twenty-four hours with intention, purpose, and joy.

This morning as I read and pondered Sarah Ban Breathnach’s entry in her daily book of inspiring insights, Simple Abundance: 365 Days to a Balanced and Joyful Life, her topic resonated with the On Waking message. The topic for today, January 30, is “Blessing Our Circumstances.”  As I read today’s entry, I made the connection that we so often and easily fail to use our daily gift of another twenty-four hours as we’ve succumbed to believing that whatever we’re experiencing on a given day is preventing us from enjoying that day.

John O’Donohue in his collection of poetry and verse titled, Bless This Space Between Us, reminds us “to retrieve the lost art of blessings for solace in today’s hectic and chaotic world.”  He points out that we each have the ability to create our own blessings. His words, “When we bless, we are enabled somehow to go beyond our present frontiers and reach into the source. A blessing awakens future Wholeness….When a blessing is invoked, a window opens in eternal time.”

It is easy to say a blessing when we feel we are experiencing something good or wonderful; the challenge is to find a way to bless current circumstances that we find difficult, threatening, or unpleasant. I haven’t mastered this concept beyond the beginning stages, but I am practicing at getting better, and occasionally I have windows of insight that suggest I’m making progress.

I’ve latched onto a couple of practical steps that are enabling me to move in this direction. When I find myself in the midst of a challenging situation, I begin by asking, “What can I learn from this experience? What is it trying to teach me?”  Living fully means that we should anticipate that we are continuing to evolve and develop, a process that requires continued learning.

I have found it helpful to remind myself of the gifts I have been given and to make a list of what I am  grateful for in the moments that I am feeling discouraged. It is so easy when we’re caught in the maelstrom of intense feelings to succumb to a belief that things won’t ever get better. But we know that such pessimistic assessments simply don’t hold water.

I remember when I was in the initial stages of realizing my marriage was ending, I was overwhelmed by what I perceived at the time was a bottomless chasm of darkness that this event let into my life. For the first and only time in my life, I felt such despair that I wondered if suicide was the answer. Once I recognized that this was what I was feeling, I immediately recalled the Good Samaritan ads that I had seen in crossing the Sagamore bridge which connects the mainland of Massachusetts with Cape Cod.

I contemplated calling the number listed, but not long into that space, just thinking about suicide briefly jettisoned me to a space that I realized no matter how challenging my current experience, the gift of life by far outweighed the challenges that we encounter on our journeys. It is amazing to look back at that period of my life with appreciation for how that event propelled me to enter therapy and address the limitations of growing up in a dysfunctional families. I know that I would not have become the person I have grown into had I remained in that marriage. I love the line from David Whyte’s poem, “Sweet Darkness,” that reminds us that we have an inner force that pushes us to evolve to what we’re capable of being:

“Sometimes it takes darkness and the sweet confinement of your aloneness to learn that anything or anyone that does not bring you alive is too small for you.”

I constantly find myself looking for simpler aims or goals. I don’t have to produce  overpowering acts, discoveries, or insights that will change the world. I am working to live in harmony and with ease, increasing the possibility that I can live fully in each moment of a new day.

Blessings to you and your loved ones; have fun creating at least five blessings each day. I am about to start up my snowblower to clear the remains of almost two feet of snow that we experienced in the Boston area over the last thirty hours. I am more than happy to bless the gift of owning a snowblower as well as being able to use it!