Thankful

“I feel a very unusual sensation – if it is not indigestion, I think it must be gratitude.” -Benjamin Disraeli

I just really, really like this photo.

Call it cliché, but it’s that time of the year and I have a lot of things to be thankful for. This morning as I walked out of the door, my secret sister (like a secret Santa, but for a semester on my floor) left me a Bible verse on my side of the door. I almost cried at the verse, it was so relevant to me:

In peace I will lie down and sleep, for you alone, Lord, make me lie down in safety. (Psalm 4:8)

What am I thankful for? So many things. The other day, one of my friends from China challenged me to post five pictures that made me happy. It was a lot harder than I had thought it would be! If you had asked me the same question five years ago, I would’ve chosen funny pictures, with a chance of being an Internet meme or comic. In recent years, however, I have been blessed with friends that I enjoy keeping in touch with. I know, I know: #blessed. Right? Such a basic, commonplace, regular thing to do, a word repeated so often that it shouldn’t really matter. As it turns out, this whole thing of being blessed has a direct impact on my life. When I was in middle and high school, I didn’t have a lot of friends. So much has changed since then, and I am so grateful for a chance to start over in a completely new place.

Ireland, England & USA!

My friends? Oh, they’re the best. I have friends all over the world now: Ireland, England, New Zealand, China – it’s fantastic. Oh, America too 🙂 My friends at school are wonderful as well: I have friends in my education classes, friends who do Bible studies, friends who are in Gospel Choir… man, life is good.

This year, I am especially grateful for my roommate. She is so wonderful in so many ways. She always listens to me talk. She takes care of me and looks out for me and talks me through the whole seizure thing. She is a role-model – she is so dedicated to exercise and cleanliness/organization! She takes time to understand and be involved. I love her lots, and am so thankful.

This isn’t to say my life is perfect. Far from it! There are a lot of things I wish I could change about myself and my life – but I’ve found that accepting those things as they are is ultimately the better option. Now, the actual acceptance process is the hard part, but the first step is knowing that acceptance is good, right? The awesome part is that when you’re choosing to accept everything, including the hard things, in life, you’re also accepting the good! Call me crazy, but I think that’s something to be grateful for. Okay, life isn’t perfect, but God is good and that’s enough for me to be happy about. Even if I wasn’t extremely grateful for the blessings in my life, God has provided the condition of the possibility (that would be getting into the philosophy that I’m learning about in class… yes, I’m even grateful for my required philosophy class!). And that’s good enough for me.