Thankful for Imperfect Things

 

~by  Linda Bevec

 

As we gather around the Thanksgiving table and begin the holiday season, I can’t help but think about all the picture perfect images we’re fed this time of year. The perfectly plump and golden turkey on a glorious platter surrounded by all the side dishes and decadent desserts spread out upon a picture perfect table. And all those who are gathered at the table take turns sharing something for which they are thankful. Family, friends, accomplishments, jobs, good fortune, and success generally make the cut. There is much to be thankful for indeed. But I think it’s important to also recognize the things in our life that are perhaps not so perfect, those things that we so often complain about, are disappointed in, or see as burdens.

 

For many of us, life doesn’t look how we think it should. We get sick. We suffer. We lose our jobs. We lose people we dearly love. We’re lonely. Marriages struggle. Friends disappoint. Finances suffocate us. Businesses crumble. Children rebel. We feel tired, betrayed and worn down.

 

We all find ourselves in situations like this…having to be strong and endure with what’s on our plate even if it’s not what we asked for or expected in life. It’s scary to soften our hearts sometimes, to see past the imperfections and to be thankful anyway. Because that’s where true gratitude is found – being thankful for imperfect things, including ourselves. Because sometimes being thankful for those things that don’t quite meet our expectations requires us to understand gratitude with a new depth and sincere honesty. In every situation we have a choice, an opportunity to be thankful and find they joy even when it doesn’t seem possible. We can embrace even our own brokenness better by seeing the flaws in things around us.

 

English author Aldous Huxly wrote, “Human beings have an almost infinite capacity for taking things for granted.” When we encounter challenges in life or find ourselves feeling disappointed with what God has placed before us, it’s often difficult to focus on our blessings or to go so far as to see those disappointments as blessings themselves and perhaps grow and learn from them. So I decided to give it a try, and throughout my day today I looked for things not quite so perfect to be thankful for. Here’s my list:

 

I’m thankful for the 5 lbs I gained even though I was trying to lose weight. It means I had food to eat, and thoroughly enjoyed it.

 

I’m thankful for dirty clothes piled high in my laundry room. It means my children have clothes to wear and have been busy and active.

 

I’m thankful it was 12 degrees outside today. It helped me appreciate our warm home, my favorite coffee cup, and time together around the fireplace.

 

I’m thankful my daughter has a fiercely strong will that often drains me. It has no doubt helped her endure a life-threatening illness since birth.

 

I’m thankful we have bills to pay. It means we can provide for our family – water, heat, clothes, food, vacations and Catholic education.

 

I’m thankful for the long line at the grocery store. I was able to have a conversation with a sweet elderly man buying flowers for his wife.

 

I’m thankful for perpetual sticky floors, counter tops and walls with fingerprints, glue and maple syrup on them. It means I have been blessed with children and their laughter still fills the air around me.

 

I’m thankful that I’m so exhausted each night. It means I worked hard and have the health and energy to care for my family.

 

I’m thankful I was running late one day last week when heading to an appointment. I could have been the one in that car accident I passed along the way.

 

I’m thankful for all my shortcomings, failures and weaknesses. They continue to lead me to seek forgiveness from a God who loves me unconditionally and always gives me the chance to start over again.

 

I’m thankful for all those people, things and circumstances around me that don’t quite measure up to what I think they should be. Because I discover there’s so much more than what I see or expect things to be. And rather than walk away disappointed, I can embrace these situations and become part of the solution to make them better.

 

How sweet it is to see the struggles, challenges, and shortcomings in so many things in life, and still be thankful. What a gift these imperfections are every single day. The people I love are wrapped up in those imperfections. I am wrapped up in them. I love them all anyway, and am perfectly blessed because of them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Join us for a parish pilgrimage to the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe near LaCrosse, Wisc.  It will be a day (or optional, two-day) visit this beautiful shrine with optional visits to Fr. Bob’s family dairy!  Don’t miss this wonderful experience!

To nourish ourselves with the Word in order to be “servants of the Word” in the work of evangelization: this is surely a priority for the Church at the dawn of the new millennium. Even in the countries evangelized many centuries ago, the reality of a “Christian society” which, amid all the frailties which have always marked human life, measured itself explicitly on Gospel values, is now gone. Today we must courageously face a situation which is becoming increasingly diversified and demanding…Over the years, I have often repeated the summons to the new evangelization. I do so again now, especially in order to insist that we must rekindle in ourselves the impetus of the beginnings, and allow ourselves to be filled with the ardor of the apostolic preaching which followed Pentecost. We must revive in ourselves the burning conviction of Paul, who cried out: “Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel” (1 Cor9:16). This passion will not fail to stir in the Church a new sense of mission, which cannot be left to a group of “specialists” but must involve the responsibility of all the members of the People of God. Those who have come into genuine contact with Christ cannot keep him for themselves, they must proclaim him. A new apostolic outreach is needed, which will be lived as the everyday commitment of Christian communities and groups…Christ  must be present to all people with confidence. We shall address adults, families, young people, children, without ever hiding the most radical demands of the Gospel message, but taking into account each person’s needs in regard to their sensitivity and language, after the example of Paul who declared: “I have become all things to all men, that I might be all means to save some” (1 Cor 9:22).

Blessed John Paul II

This meditation was featured in “Magnificat’s” Thursday, April 25, 2013, Meditation of the Day.