Mastering Gratitude

I am so excited to see a shift in my thinking. Yesterday, I experienced something that would, in all likelihood cause anyone to feel anger and resentment rather than peace and gratitude and just a year ago, I would not have been an exception to that.

Here’s the story.

A few days ago, I saw my neighbor out in front of his house when I got home from work. My neighbor is a landscaper and I have seen his passion for his own landscape, so I had spoken to him a while ago about some things I could do to help my own lawn. We had talked about making sure to aerate the lawn in Fall. So, I saw my neighbor and remembered that conversation and asked him if he could come by and aerate my lawn. He said he needed to wait for a good rain to loosen up the soil first, but then he would do it.

Well, it rained on Friday evening. So, I was on my way out of the house yesterday and there he was, out in front of my house with his aerator. I had not anticipated him coming so soon, for some reason and was mostly concerned that I didn’t have means to pay him at that moment, but I was already running a bit late so I asked him if it would be okay to pay him the next day and he said, that would be fine.

So, now I’m really started to feel rushed. I hop in my car and proceed to back out of my driveway and then, “CRUNCH”. What the heck happened? I look back and instantly realized that I hadn’t noticed that the handle of the aerator was partly in my driveway, and I ran right into it without noticing it.

The first thing I thought was, “I hope I didn’t damage my neighbor’s aerator.” I got out of my car and looked at it and saw that it did not appear to be damaged and I told my neighbor that if there was anything wrong with it, I would take care of it.  My own car, was damaged. I smashed my left blinker light covering. My neighbor felt bad that he had left the aerator where he did. To me, however, I was actually thankful. It occurred to me quickly, that in the frame of mind I was in, driving a lethal weapon was not a good idea. I realized, right away, that I could have just run into my neighbor, or even a child. How much worse would that have been? Now, I don’t want to go into all the what if’s, the point is only that, instead of feeling resentful that my neighbor had shown up unexpectedly and left his aerator partly in the path of my driveway where it would damage my car, or feeling angry at myself for being so stupid as to not notice it, I felt totally thankful and blessed to have only done a small bit of damage to my car and nothing or no one else.

Additionally, I had an opportunity to show my son, not only how to see something like this as a positive thing, but also to show him that even experienced drivers can make mistakes. I remember when I was younger, often believing that I had mastered driving and that I wouldn’t make mistakes like that. I have since come to understand that many times that I had avoided collisions when I was younger was not as much due to some sort of driving proficiency as it was due to sheer luck. Now I know better, but I needed to have moments like the one I had yesterday to teach me that. I can’t say what my son (who’s only 12 right now) will take away from this, but I did explain to him that he will need to be vigilant all the time, when he drives, in order to minimize any chance of a fatal mistake.

I am seeing so much more wealth in my life. I hope this will help others to see the good in their lives.