A Year of Gratitude – February 14, 2024
It’s Valentine’s Day. I know that today is beloved by many and dreaded by just as many. It’s a day that can be a delight but can just as easily be a reminder of what we don’t have in our lives. The expectations put on this day are steep and narrow.
If you had a day spent with your valentine, I do hope that you enjoyed every moment together. This holiday can be such a wonderful reason to show someone how much they mean to you.
If you had a day that was a struggle, I hope that you found a way to show yourself a bit of kindness, to find joy in the places you do on days that aren’t February 14th. I know that this holiday might make that difficult, but I hope that you did.
I found my gratitude in a very non-traditional Valentine’s Day manner today. I was having a day that wasn’t going the way I wanted it to. I was having a difficult time with a few realities in my life and having a tough time setting them aside to go about my day.
I needed to do something that kept my hands busy and mind distracted. So, I worked on my flooring project for the first time in a few weeks. It was terribly cold and blustery outside, but the bright sunshine was streaming through the windows. The sunlight seemed to fill the room with warmth, so I stood in it and soaked it up for a few minutes. I turned on some music and immersed myself in the work ahead.
As I worked, I could feel myself letting go of the very things I had not been able to earlier. It was a relief to stop carrying them. It was a gift I gave myself, permission to set them down.
After a few hours of work, I stood back and admired my progress. These old boards have been freed from the years of paint, carpet, and dust they were trapped beneath for so long. I am so glad that we will be able to appreciate them, to see the beauty in their imperfections and celebrate their history.
In the end, that’s what I want for myself and for you. I want us to be able to love and appreciate ourselves as we are, to find beauty in our lives despite their imperfections, and to feel proud of all that we have endured and overcome.
I hope that today, no matter the date and the holiday, was a day that landed gently and that you found a way to love yourself. That isn’t always easy, but it can make such a difference.
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It’s the week of Valentine’s Day. I know that makes this a wonderful week for some of you and a painful week for many. The world wants us to focus on romantic love, the kind that knocks you off your feet. But everyone doesn’t have that sort of love in their lives this year which means that framing of the holiday leaves out far too many people.
I’d much rather focus on celebrating this week by loving each other, loving the people in our lives, and loving ourselves. I’d like to mark the week by celebrating in a way that involves everyone who wants to participate. We’re all worthy of love, of celebrating Valentine’s Day in our own way.
So, I’m going to focus my daily gratitude this week on the sort of love that we choose. If you choose to love something about your day, about your life, you’re also painting it with gratitude. Really, love and gratitude aren’t very different from one another.
To celebrate Valentine’s Day, I’m going to share something I love with you each day this week. They fill my heart with joy not because they have anything to do with romance. I’m grateful for each and every one of them.
I hope that you’ll share something that you love and that doing so will fill you with gratitude. I also hope that the people around us will feel that gratitude and love spill over onto them. That’s the sort of Valentine’s Day week I’d like to celebrate.
This post is part of our A Year of Gratitude Series. You can find the introduction, inspiration, and entire year’s gratitude’s posts here.