Thanksgiving by Leslie Fieger

I was not planning to write this article. Instead, I was going to publish an article about integrity. It has been on my mind this last week and I was planning to share some thoughts about it. Then, I received an email from Jim Donovan, one of the regular contributors to my Prosperity Paradigm eZine, and it inspired me to write once again about the magical power of gratitude.

Yes, the magical power.

Before I talk about the magic of gratitude, I want to talk about its opposite. Not the lack, not ingratitude; but resentfulness.

Powerful emotions attached to specific repetitive thoughts make things manifest. Intentional thought combined with heartfelt desire is how masters and winners create the circumstances and events of their lives. This powerful knowledge is one of the most crucial things a person who desires to be a creator instead of a mere creature needs to know and integrate into their life.

There is a dark side. Just as what you love/desire can come true, so too, as even the bible reminds us...that what you fear shall come to pass. You can witness the power of fear making things happen in many people's lives. A victim's attitude often creates events that cause that person to say, "see, I told you so." They don't, of course, know that it was their very own fear that attracted the bad thing into their life. The proverbial self-fulfilling prophecy.

It works the same with gratitude and resentfulness. When you walk around with the attitude of gratitude, life does not just seem better because of your psychological take on life, it actually is better because of the magic creative power of intentionally combining positive thought and positive emotion.

However, when you adopt the attitude of resentfulness, things don't just seem bad...bad things actually do happen more often than they would otherwise. Resentfulness is insidious. Once you start to resent the circumstances and conditions of your life, you begin attracting more things into your life that you will not welcome UNTIL AND UNLESS you change your attitude. Some molehill appears and your resentfulness makes it into a mountain. The next thing you know, a real mountain shows up. Why? Because you attracted it. And now it is harder to be grateful instead of resentful.

That is why masters at the art of living see obstacles as an opportunity to learn, to grow, to become more powerful; and, winners see obstacles as proof that they are traveling the high road. They know that the flat, wide, easy road is the path of mediocrity. It is wide, flat and easy because it is well traveled by the majority who do not aspire or dare to achieve great things. or to challenge life and themselves to deliver more than the norm.

Losers resent winners. You see it all the time. The average person delights in the often public trials and tribulations of the high achievers. Losers do not 'get it' that it is their own resentfulness that makes them losers. They don't get that the winner is grateful not just because things are going right, but because it is the gratitude that makes things go right in the first place.

If you want to be a winner, start being grateful; start existing in a constant state of thanksgiving. You don't need some annual celebration of some romanticized historical event to feel grateful. As long as you are still breathing, you have much to be thankful for. You have, right now, the chance to make a meaningful difference in the lives of other people. You have, right now, the chance to appreciate all you have been given. You have, right now, the chance to enjoy the pleasures of walking around on planet earth. Remember this, if you are reading this, you should know that you are better off than the overwhelming majority of other people on this planet.

Give thanks. You'll end up with plenty to be grateful for.

Read some brief thoughts about thanksgiving from others who know the magic power of gratitude.

Happy thanksgiving!