Gratitude

I am usually not a huge Opera Winfrey fan, but sometimes she offers very good advice. Recently I read some comments she made about the idea of a "Gratitude Journal". Each day, to simply write down 5 things you were grateful for, it could be big or small, the examples were, "you were thankful for your kids, your wife, your job, down to, you were thankful for a meal you had, a conversation you had with a friend, something beautiful about nature that really caught your attention, going for a jog, etc, etc." The book recommends doing this for 30 days to form a habit of noticing things to be grateful for.

What a great habit, St. Paul says to, "dedicate yourself to thanksgiving," and the more you go out of your way to notice your blessings, the more you will be caught up in how many blessings are out there in the world.

One blessing among many for me is art. I have always had a special love for art, since I was very young, and recently I have taken it up again, sort of as a creative release at night. It has been a tremendous blessing for me, because when I am drawing, I am able to think clearly about other areas of my life that need creative thinking, almost always when I sit down to draw, another idea will come to me.

On the right hand side of the blog, is a drawing I recently finished entitled, "Blessed Damian Confesses," Blessed Damian went to the Leprosy colony in Hawaii to serve the leper's spiritual needs, which were many, because of being outcasts, there was a deep sense of abandonment from God, and Damian went there to bring God's closeness and love, in the process, he contracted leprosy himself, and because he was the only priest on the island, and other priests were afraid of leprosy, he would wade into the water, and yell his sins to a priest on the boat, and receive absolution. The point of the drawing, is that so many people over-complicate confession. I've had to realize through the years that its Jesus who seeks me in confession, not the other way around, because I make the effort to get to confession, its easy to believe that its me seeking Jesus. Its Jesus who desires like a Good Sheppard to seek me out, and set me on His shoulders,"