The power of gratitude

One of my comforts as a child was reading and one of my favorite sources was a magazine that used to come every month or so to my auntie, but it ended at my house, so I used to get to it first.

It came from a Japanese religion, Seicho-no-ie, and the stories were inspiring! But one topic was always present: be grateful.

I confess as the years passed by, I simply forgot about that, until many and many years ago, and since then, I started to practice the simple act of gratitude.

It can be a conscious act, like saying thank you, smiling in a cheerful way or send a message to a person.

It can also be unconscious. As I moved from Sao Paulo, the land of please and thank you – we say that all the time to anyone – I realized people used to look at me differently in situations when my thank you was not really clear, like thanking a bus driver. Slowly, I learned to express the gratitude I was taught in a more subtle way through a small gesture of the head or a different smile. Well, with some friends even a joke can work as an expression of gratitude…

Gratitude turns into a power when, besides the act, it is felt within in a deep way, generating a wonderful healing sensation that life opened its arms to me through this person or situation.

That power can break down obstacles, elevate a person so that they are higher than bad situations and even rebuild bridges with other people.

Be grateful.

Be powerfully grateful.

Errors, mistakes, a good thing?

What to do when we make a mistake?

In the old culture, we would fight against mistakes and condemn everyone who commit them as sinners… After all, we should be perfect, right? At some level, it worked as people tried their best to avoid errors; on the other hand, it created a fake side of our society, with lots of people hiding their mistakes.

Our present new culture is different. An interesting cartoon circulating around shows two parents in the past complaining to their boy about his marks; at present, they were complaining TO THE TEACHER about the same… We tried so much to prevent errors, that we start to think we don’t make mistakes.

A story was sent via internet not long ago, about a person from a new generation. She made a mistake in the text she wrote, and her boss explained it to her. Big oops! The young employee couldn’t accept and made it very clear, not only in her office, but she even called her mother, who, apparently, supported her perfect daughter.

But it is not the young woman’s fault or her mother’s; it is the context we have created along the years, pretending no errors ever occur, of if they do, it is because we were bad people. Very bad people.

Maybe we should visit that topic and rethink it. Errors are not good, mistakes can damage relationships, ruin careers and many other bad consequences, and yet, it is one of the best ways to learn! In fact, it is not realistic to expect perfection at the first time…

Mistakes can be our teacher, if we allow them to do that, instead of making us into sinners or horrible people.

They can be the leverage we need for our transformation.