Everyday Thanksgiving May

“Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more”–Melody Beattle

This is my monthly gratitude post. Everyday we have the opportunity to choose abundance or lack, pleasure or pain, gratitude or resentment. I chose a joyful rich life full of gratitude. Feel free to join me.

May 2013

Thank you for my wife feeling better after taking vitamin D; strider bikes;  long walks in our neighborhood; a call from my dear friend, Nancy; my cousin’s critical thinking.

laughter and mohawks

Thank you for Sunday picnic; my 5 year old son scoring 3 goals sporting a Mohawk; a whole day with my family; a purpose driven life; dreams that reconcile a past wrong.

Thank you for my wife’s love even when she is exhausted; reconnecting with friends who I thought had abandoned me; ripe, juicy tomatoes; Vega-One supplements; all the inspiration I am blessed with everyday.

Thank you for clean fresh water; time spent outdoors; my sons’ healthy appetites; the simplicity of Thich Nhat Hanh’s writing; realizing that I am like my step-father.

Thank you for parallel realities; releasing those around me who are on a different vibration; walking my sons to school with my wife; realizing how little I need from the outside world; the bonds that grow stronger with my blogging best friends.

Thank you for meditation premonitions; Peace in Marriage; the Tibetan 5 Rites Yoga;  changing my reactions to a lagging reality; my son’s demands to “sweep wit me right NOW!”

Thank you for raspberry fingertips; the dinner discussion about meditation I had with my sons; twisted logic of childhood innocence: “Are monks bald like my pee-pee, Daddy?”; the new website;  slowing down to enjoy my sons.

Thank you for Sunshine’s Gratitude post; Costco rotisserie chicken; Scooby Doo and how my sons try to sing the theme song; the vision to see we still have injustices to overcome; MLK’s I have a dream speech-“their destiny is tied up with our destiny.”

Thank you for the amazing under 12 soccer game we watched today; dreams of travel to Japan; how my 3 year old mimics his older brother’s kung fu moves; clarity of purpose in my life; my wife, the mother of our children. Happy Mother’s Day, Honey.

The Mother I Love

Thank you for Coldplay; Rarasaur and all the magic she gives for free; Mother Gaia and all she provides; Seva and Dana; faith in the Universe–“Life is so intelligent.”

Thank you for cutting and pasting between different programs. Word>Firefox; release of need; the talk about raising boys I listened to today; thoughtful emails; another bout of creative insomnia.

Thank you for the abundance of laughter from my sons; my younger son’s ploys to avoid bedtime; feedly.com; the phone call from Chuy that reaffirmed my purpose; all the Light and Spirit I am showered with everyday.

Thank you for the reminder to stop thinking about money everyday; 30 day money back guarantees; field trips for my kindergartener; the wonderful birthday wishes; the massager and thoughtful gifts from my wife.

Thank you for the tenderness of my younger son; my older son’s homemade Kung Fu staff; my parents and brother coming out to see my son’s soccer game; my wife’s text message–I love u “3,4,5”; learning to persevere with patience.

Thank you for the sunny disposition that shines through the daily clouds of darkness: the vision of how to serve others; all my loved ones who have passed away supporting me in ways I cannot imagine; the spirit I had as a child resurfacing 40 years later; all the messages to just be, rather than do busyness.

Thank you for shrimp curry; bitter melon; the amazing guided meditation I did last night; 8 hours of deep sleep; Alison guiding me towards Adyashanti.

Thank you for John Gray; Zach Sobiech; the Origin of Love from Hedwig and the Angry Inch; the power of the internet to spread love and goodwill; woe in life to bring forth growth.

Thank you for holidays; courage to be truthful; ice cream socials; water pressure; youtube.

Thank you for the amazing capabilities of Mac; races between 3 year olds; ice to soothe my sore knee; bold enthusiasm; the confidence to tell my story.

Thank you for my son’s wonderful 6th birthday; the thoughtful parents who bought my 3 year old a gift as well.; a day full of smiles, laughter, and good energy; playing Operation with my sons–with the new fart sounds; feeling good about myself again.

Thank you for Freedom; the kind thoughts on Memorial Day; all who have sacrificed for our freedom; all men and women in the armed forces who put their lives on the line for our safety; selfless service.

Thank you for fresh fruit for dessert instead of sugar; naps in the car; a whole day with the boys; self-actualization and social contribution; Amit Goswami and Quantum Physics.

Thank you for Pema Chodron; Persian food; being at peace with wealth; 3 am epiphanies; reliable internet and phone services.

Thank you for faking it, until you make it via Professions for Peace; mattress pads for potty training toddlers; extra hours of sunlight; countdown to summer vacation; 7 months of no cable television.

Related articles

• Everyday Thanksgiving: April (everydaygurus.com)

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Everyday Thanksgiving: April

When you arise in the morning think of what a privilege it is to be alive, to think, to enjoy, to love.”~Marcus Aurelius

To start this month’s post on gratitude, I want to thank everyone who clicks on this blog. Your presence, your comments, your {{{hugs}}}, and your support give me hope everyday that we can and will make a difference. I feel so blessed that I have found a community devoted towards peace, love, understanding, and compassion. Thank you for everything you do.

This is my monthly post of things I am grateful for. Feel free to post what you are grateful for in the comments. The more gratitude we give, the more love and peace we will experience.

Everyday Thanksgiving–March 2013

“Thank you, Lord, for what you’ve done for me.
Thank you, Lord, for what you’re doing now.
Thank you, Lord, for ev’ry little thing.
Thank you, Lord, for you made me sing.“~Bob Marley

This is my monthly download of my daily gratitude practice–everyday I try to post five things that I am grateful for. Hope you find gratitude in your life.

Everyday Thanksgiving–February 2013

Gratitude is free to all, yet pays exponentially. Forget Apple. Invest in Gratitude.

This is the monthly download of my daily gratitude practice–everyday I try to post five things I am grateful for. Gratitude continues to alter my life in so many ways. I don’t expect anyone to read this list, but I hope you discover the power of gratitude.

February  2013

Thank you for the way my son puts his hand on my heart when we sleep together; my wife being such an amazingly successful doctor; Frankenweenie for movie night with the family; the wonderful massage my wife gave me; my older son’s joy for play.

Everyday Thanksgiving–January 2013

“A thankful person is a thankful person under all circumstances.”–Baha’u’llah (1817-1892)

This is the monthly download of my daily gratitude practice–everyday I try to post five things I am grateful for. Gratitude continues to alter my life in so many ways. I don’t expect anyone to read this list, but I hope you discover the power of gratitude.

January 2013

Thank you for bubbles–cheap, but full of joy; the wonderful peace post by Grandmalin; living in a time of peace in America; all the food that was given to us over the holidays; the amazing edit Joanne Wadsworth did on my first chapter.

Thank you for my empathic wife; legos, especially Star Wars legos; Vietnamese hairdressers who know how to cut Asian hair; Anne Hathaway’s performance in Les Miserable; second chances.

A Letter to My BBFs (Blogging Best Friends)

Dear Blogging Best Friends,

I don’t know much about you. For all I know you might have voted the exact opposite I did in November, or you might have been rooting for the American athletes to fail in the London Olympics.

You also don’t know me. For example, many of my blogging best friends are women who don’t know that being a Japanese American male, I am Patriarchy’s uber child. I have not always treated women the way they deserve to be treated. If you talked to my ex-girlfriends and even my wife, they would tell you that, at best, I am a work in progress. Although my life’s work centers around peace, I have not always been a peaceful person in thoughts, words, or actions.

The one thing I do know from being your blogging best friend is who we want to be, who we strive to be. I know what is in our souls trying to get out, even if our consciousness is not in accord with that spirit.

Biggest Hypocrite Blogger Award

I am such an ingrate. Even though I post five things to be grateful for each day, I still take things for granted. Case in point, blogger awards. I have been so busy with Bloggers for Peace that I have not reciprocated on no less than 10 blogger awards. Thanks to Rarasaur for hitting me in the head of how important blogger awards are. It’s hypocritical to try to recruit members of Bloggers for Peace while ignoring these special awards and the amazing bloggers who nominated everydaygurus (EG). I am going to adjust the rules, however, so I don’t bore you to death.

Bloggers for Peace–Learning to Fly

Bloggers for Peace is growing so fast that we have created its own page. Thanks to the incredible web skills of Cheri Roberts, I am pleased to present to you the Bloggers4Peace web site. We also have two URLs–Bloggers4Peace.org and B4Peace.org. The new site is a static instructional site that will give people information about what we are all about. If you want to tell someone what Bloggers4Peace is about, just send them to the site or give them one of the URLs which are connected to the site.

Everyday Thanksgiving–December

“A thankful heart hath a continual feast”–W.J. Cameron

This is the monthly download of my daily gratitude practice–everyday I post five things I am grateful for. Gratitude has changed my life. You don’t need to read my list, but I hope you will start your own.

December 2012

Thank you for being Freshly Pressed and the lessons it has taught me; all the likes, comments, and follows; my amazing wife who taught me to see the doughnut, not the hole; my youngest doing his business on the toilet–Freshly Pressed and no dirty diaper today; validation that comes from within.

Doing something a little different today thanks to A Table in the Sun. Here is my top five wish list of things money can’t buy.

1. A constant reminder of how lucky we are to be alive in this wonderful country where anything is possible.
2. To be able to hug the chubby cheeks of my sons whenever I feel like it.
3. To have peace of mind no matter what is going on around me.
4. To have all the people I love know in their hearts that I love them.
5. To continue to grow in all ways towards unending happiness and joy

Action/Reaction: Failure in 2012 and What to Do About It

“You will not be judged on what people do to you, but how you react.”–Anonymous

On my bad days, I react to events like water poured on boiling oil, burning everyone in sight, even those trying to help.  You could say I have an itchy trigger finger, ready to attack anything that provokes me with my semi-automatic tongue.

One of the reasons I practice meditation every day is to become aware of exactly when my “fire” ignites. If I can catch a negative reaction when it is just one thought, I can extinguish it before my anger and frustration create a three alarm catastrophe. Like a single matchstick, it is easy to blow out a negative thought with a smile or a breath of gratitude. This practice has quadrupled the number of happy moments I experience daily and changed the course of my life.

But after reading the posts by Mirth and Motivation and Professions for PEACE in response to the Newtown  shooting, I realized that simply responding to external events is not good enough.