Hunger for Life

“And when I give thanks for the seemingly microscopic, I make a place for God to grow within me.”- Ann Voskamp

New York Times Bestselling author Ann Voskamp recently released an incredible book called, One Thousand Gifts: A Dare To Live Fully Where You Are. Each line is filled with challenges and thought-provoking pithy, poetic ideas. These ideas breathe a certain air that cultivates a lightness of spirit. The words that she strings together all teeter in and out of the genuine need for Thanksgiving.

The title of her book describes her journey in finding, seeing and writing down one thousand gifts that she has been given eyes to see. Whether it’s sunlight reflecting on a bubble or strawberry jam on toast—she has written each one down and in doing so has created an attitude and lifestyle of thanksgiving.

 Finding these little thankful moments takes time and also the eyes to see beauty in everyday life. The challenge to this kind of mindfulness is not a new idea in North American culture. Most of us are trying not to run around frantically. We know that the rushing crushes our souls but we feel like we have no choice.

We don’t want to be that person who lets precious moments pass us by. We fill our photo albums with snapshots of laughter and fun but are we really relishing each moment or are we just ticking another vacation off our list? The problem of time and the genuine practice of being still remains—staring us in the face. Ann Voskamp gives insight to this struggle of time; “When I fully enter time’s swift current, enter into the current moment with the weight of all my attention, I slow the torrent with the weight of me all here.”

Part of this issue (of remaining in the present) may be that we fail to step back to get an aerial view of life. When we can’t live in the present it’s harder to give thanks and when we can’t step back and see the bigger picture (as well as the smaller aspects) it is difficult to steward time and daily decisions. Part of the reason we also may not give thanks is because we don’t believe that gratitude has power to change the outlook of our lives. We might weigh how much time and effort this new lifestyle venture may take and think it’s not worth it. Whatever the case, a life perspective that is infused with thanksgiving is surely worth the cost.

Life is not a chunk of time that we live in. There are minute blessings (and really big ones too) that fill up the present. When we can see the past as a chart of thankfulness, the future is like a golden stream of dreams. This October give thanks for your friends and family—and continue to try give thanks everyday.

Coming from Ann Voskamp, here are some practical tips in learning to give Thanks:

1. Be aware of the little or minute gifts in life. “Gratitude for the seemingly insignificant—a seed—this plants the giant miracle.”

2. Hunger to taste life. “I am a hunter of beauty and I move slow and I keep the eyes wide, every fiber of every muscle sensing all wonder and this is the thrill of the hunt and I could be an expert on the life full, the beauty meat that lurks in every moment.”

3. Find beauty in suffering. “The ugly can be beautiful. The dark can give birth to life; suffering can deliver grace.”

Like Ann Voskamp, do you think you could write down a thing or two each day that you are thankful for? Keep a journal of all the things that you are thankful for and see if you start feeling lighter even amidst the harder things that you have to go through. In the words of Ann, “Can [you] look long enough to see the beauty in every situation?”

Take the next step:
Teaching Thankfulness to Children

Tags: Andrea Debruin, Ann Voskamp, beauty, family issues, gifts, giving thanks in all things, One Thousand Gifts, thankfulness, Thanksgiving, Time, values, wisdom

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