An Australian living in France. But it’s not all wine & cheese! I work (freelance communications). I write stuff & I’m on the lookout for new adventures.

Aug 10, 2016

365 days of grateful

Morning gratitude — an unedited view from my terrace

I remember reading about the 365 Grateful Project a few years ago. And I remember thinking, ‘what a great idea’. But that’s as far as I got with it. It was a passing thought. There was no effort on my part to really stop and think about gratitude let alone practice it.

Fast forward to now and I’ve started my own #365grateful project, taking a photo each day of something for which I feel grateful. Why? As I said on my first post that kick started my project on 1 July this year, I have a tendency to see the world through not-so-rose-coloured glasses. I can easily feel overwhelmed by what’s going wrong in the world, which can cloud my judgment when it comes to my own situation.

I don’t live in the ‘third’ world (even using that term makes me wiggle uncomfortably in my chair. After all, who came up with that label? Where’s the second world?). I live smack bang in the middle of middle-class France. And I come from middle-class Australia. Pretty fortunate, huh? Well, yes. But that’s not to say I don’t have my fair share of noise and clutter to work through each day. As a friend so eloquently said (in response to my first #365grateful post), “when there’s a lot of detail going on it can be hard to delight in small but beautiful things that can happen every day”.

So, after a little more than one month in, how am I going? Well, it has its ups & downs! There are days when gratitude comes easily and I do delight in the ‘small but beautiful things’. Then there are days when I almost shy away from posting because I just can’t for the life of me find something for which to feel grateful. And perhaps therein lies the problem. I’m actively searching rather than letting things come to me, no matter how small or ‘insignificant’ they may seem.

In doing this, I do sometimes worry that this could be seen as a bragging competition. After all, I live in a pretty nice part of the world where people from near and far race to visit when the opportunity arises. But that couldn’t be further from the truth. It’s not about place. It’s not about things. It’s about reflection and gratitude. It’s about reminding myself that while life can be a tough nut to crack, there’s a hell of a lot to be grateful for along the way.