Gratitude

I was going to write about my exploration of thinking today but that will have to wait. This morning I had a great realization about gratitude and want to share it.

I have always had a bit of a problem with the Law of Attraction and its insistence that all you have to do is "feel" like you already have what you want and that energy will attract what you want. A lot of peoples interest (and mine too) in the Law of Attraction seems to be around money or the lack of it. It has been very difficult to maintain the feeling that I have plenty of money when I don't. And it seems to me that spending money as if I already had enough as part of the "feeling" of already having enough, is a little careless.

At the same time, I have always believed that gratitude and appreciation are very powerful tools for achieving happiness and peace of mind. When I feel down, I often look around and list the thing I'm grateful for.

Now I believe that the Universe wants us to be happy. (By the way I use the terms Universe and God interchangeably but  the Universe has less baggage in preconceived beliefs associated with it.) But just giving us what we desire doesn't guarantee that we will be happy. Take money for example. There are some very rich, very miserable people out there. And we've all heard stories about people who won a huge lottery and are now unhappy and wish they hadn't.

So maybe the Universe understands that in order to be happy, we need to evolve into beings who appreciate life in general with all of it's ups and downs, and not just the fleeting gratitude when we have our desires fulfilled. And maybe if we are grateful for just being alive and for having everything that we DO have, then we might make different choices that lead us towards what we want. I can get behind the Law of Attraction now that I see it as being like two magnets that are drawn and move towards each other rather than me just trying hard enough to "feel" like I already have what I want.

If I feel grateful for Life then I am already happier. I can still desire "stuff" but my happiness is no longer dependent upon that particular desire being fulfilled. And if the Law of Attraction IS true, then my gratitude makes it more likely that I'll get what I desire.

Cool!