Stop...Look...Go
“The root of joy is gratitude…
it’s not joy that makes us grateful,
it’s gratitude that makes us joyful”
David Steindl-Rast
Stop...Look...Go
This is the lesson from interfaith scholar, David Steindl-Rast in his Ted Talk titled, Want to be happy? Be grateful. You can stop reading now and go directly to this powerful video. From this moment forward, I’m simply restating his words from my notes. This is your gift. It is a valuable gift. It is a freely given gift. Stop. Look. Go.
What We All Have In Common
It is true of us all. We are seeking happiness. We are seeking lives of joy. We all want to be happy. And as the title of the talk suggests, if we want to be happy, we must be grateful.
How Gratefulness Works
To understand gratefulness, we need to look to our own experiences of receiving. When we receive a gift that is freely given and of great value, we experience gratefulness. And gratefulness leads to happiness. It is not the other way around. Gratefulness is the fruit of a freely given, valuable gift. Happiness is the fruit gratefulness bears.
Grateful Living
Gratitude and happiness are not limited to occasional moments. We can be grateful for every moment. This is grateful living. We can live moment after moment in the awareness that every moment is a gift and every moment is of great value. This is grateful living. And within this gift lies another gift. This gift of opportunity. Opportunity to enjoy and do something with the gift of this moment. We are offered the choice to avail ourselves to the gift of the moment or miss it. The master key to our happiness is in our hands, moment to moment.
Every Moment, Not Everything
This is a key point to remember. We cannot be grateful for everything, but we can be grateful for every moment. There is a difference. We are not grateful for violence, war, oppression, or exploitation. We are not grateful for the loss of a friend, unfaithfulness, or bereavement. However, we can be grateful for every given moment.
Every Moment is an Opportunity
If we stop and look, we have the opportunity to respond to the moment. When difficulties arise, we can rise to the opportunity. This challenge is sometimes painful, but through the pain of the moment, we can learn. We can rise. The people we most admire are the ones who avail themselves to challenging and difficult opportunities. The people we admire are the ones who make something out of the moments that life gives them. Those who fail when those moments arise are given another opportunity. Over and over again. How beautiful that we always get another opportunity with every new moment.
Stop...Look...Go
The method for living gratefully moment by moment is simple. In fact it's is so simple, we teach it to children as they cross the road. Stop. Look. Go. To live gratefully, we must build stop signs in our lives. Reminders to be aware of our moments. We must be quiet in order to look and see opportunities in each moment. We must do something to either enjoy the moment or rise to it. This is grateful living. This is joyful living.
Revolutionizing Our World
Grateful living is a potent seed that can help us revolutionize the world moment by moment. If we stop, look, and go, we can enjoy or rise to the opportunity of each new moment. People are becoming more aware of the value and gift of gratefulness. Consider this. If we are grateful, we are not fearful. If we’re not fearful, we’re not violent. If we’re grateful, we act out of a sense of enough rather than a sense of scarcity, and this sense of enough nurtures a willingness to share. If we’re grateful, we enjoy the differences between each other and respect each other. If we're grateful, we can revolutionize our world.
A Network, Not a Pyramid
We live in a world with a power pyramid. The powerful few are at the top and the powerless many are at the bottom. The answer is not to turn the pyramid upside-down and create a new pyramid. The answer is to revolutionize the revolution. The answer is to create a network. This is the revolution. The non-violent revolution that seeks a network of smaller and smaller groups that interact and connect with one another to form a grateful world. If we have a network of people in a grateful world, we will have a network of people in a joyful world. A grateful world is a joyful and happy world. So let's revolutionize the world starting right now.
Stop...Look...Go
Enjoy the moment.
Rise to the moment.
Enjoy the day!
