40 Days of Gratitude

Part of my Lenten discipline is to choose one thing each day for which I am truly grateful. Not just a quick, "Thank you Jesus for my family,” kind of grateful, but the realization that I don't deserve this in anyway and it is a pure and beneficent gift from God kind of grateful. I've heard that gratitude can break down barriers. I'm thinking this is why God has led me in this direction. We'll see what He has in store.

Today, because it is Ash Wednesday (a day of fast and abstinence - from meat of course:)- in the Catholic Church), I focused on being grateful for food. This seems pretty basic I know but on a day when I actually denied myself for a brief period, it felt pretty important.

What struck me today is what makes fasting so hard. It's not so much the hunger pangs, although they do get pretty strong mid-afternoon and I get pretty grouchy come dinner time. What makes it hard is that I am surrounded by food. I had to feed my kids, go to the grocery store, make dinner, put things away in a pantry loaded with food, dole out snacks, and see pictures of it in my mailbox, billboards and magazines.

I realize that this is a good problem to have. I have never gone without food because there was nothing to eat. I have never felt true hunger. Now that I'm the shopper in the family, I eat what I like when I like. I have experienced food all over the world.

It's so easy to take something like this for granted, but today I am truly grateful for food.