Gratitude

Mindful inventory of our gratitude is good for our mental health and every kind of personal performance. Meditation on gratitude can even help us be physically healthier and more resilient.

If you’re like me, it’s been a challenging year; uncertainty and loss all around. Everything we try to do every day is just a little more complicated than it would be during normal times. Where do we find solace?

Maybe, just maybe, we find solace in saying thank you.

So, during this week that many of my fellow Americans will find themselves saying the word “thankful” more than usual, I invite you to join me. Take a deep breath, focus on who / what brings your gratitude to the fullest life, and try to make this beat up old world a little healthier.

What am I grateful for? Well…

I’m grateful for my family. (Obviously for #geekdadwarjournal, that was a given.)

The family I choose. The home team. The pack.

We dream together, struggle together, laugh together. We nurture, inspire and entertain the hell out of each other.

If family was the only good, good thing in my life, it would be more than enough to consider myself blessed. Family makes house a home. I say that without irony or cynicism.

BUT I also have daily gratitude for both irony and cynicism…

I’m grateful we can still laugh…

And laugh…

And laugh. (Thank you, here, to a partner in storytelling and a friend, Jodi!) Which brings me to…

Collaborators! Where would we be without our creative partners and other friends — intimate or remote, or in many cases this year, both — you make life sweet, and amplify the power of story to help us all grow, travel, learn, and sometimes, just keep it together!

Seriously, all businesses have had an uphill year — though most of us creatives are nowhere near as challenged as friends in live theater, travel and fine dining — but putting our heads, hearts and hands together, we continue to do the work, and even make progress in business in books, comics, music and TV.

With all the help we can get from our friends.

Which brings me to collaborations from people we may never have met in person… all of you readers who share back at us!

One of the perks of making stories for a living is seeing the different perspectives on our stories and characters that bounce back to us. I’m grateful for these… it shows someone gets us! Thanks to all of you, including these pieces from Gregory C. Giordano and UNCANNYKNACK!

And I never forget the readers… thank you, across all countries and generations. 

And, finally…

To all our doctors and nurses, first responders, essential workers… and to every person who takes the simple precautions to protect themselves and each other. Those of us who are grateful for our health are grateful for you.

We have seen our worst in the last few years… and we have also seen our best. Gratitude.

And to YOU… thanks for reading and staying in touch through this blog. Take care of yourself.