Day 5: Gift of Gratitude – Growth Through Struggle

“I am thankful for my struggle because without it, I wouldn’t have stumbled across my strength.” – Alex Elle

How easy is it for us to be grateful when things are going our way?  Very Easy, we will even pat ourselves on the back and say, ‘Look at what I did’.  How easy is it to be grateful when something goes our way, but more doesn’t go our way?  Not as easy, but we still have that carrot in front of us that says, ‘You’ve done some good, keep pushing’.  How easy is it to be grateful when, over the last month or even a year, nothing seems to have gone right, and everything has been a struggle?  This is when it is the hardest, and least likely you will say or think of being grateful.  It’s hardest to feel thankful when we’re in pain — yet struggle shapes us in ways comfort never could.  Gratitude doesn’t deny hardship; it honors the growth that hardship produces.  Through gratitude, we see challenges not as punishments but as opportunities to become stronger, wiser, and more compassionate.
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There are always things, events from our past that were successful; they don’t just go away because they are in the past.  Remember those successes as a form of motivation and inspiration.  Each past success was a “step up”.  Just because you are not having success right now, it just means “rest”, and “evaluate” your current progress, then keep stumbling forward.