Help Meet Ch. 3
- A Thankful Spirit
"A Merry Heart vs. a Poor-Me Attitude"
- I love this quote: "A wise woman sets a joyful mood in her home. Through laughter, music, and happy times, she creates a positive attitude in her children. She knows that a lighthearted home relieves her husband of stress." I have found that if I want to introduce some peace and calm to our home, I can play Scott Roberts' CD "I Sing Because", and my spirit just relaxes. The music itself is not slow tempo or boring, but it is peace-inducing for me. That's just an example of one way I have found to deliberately set the mood and atmosphere of our home.
- Debi reminds me that being discontented with our physical or spiritual circumstances is dishonoring to God and to my husband. Like Paul I should learn to be content in whatever state I am. There can be no lasting happiness without contentment. If I am looking to my circumstances for my happiness, my level of happiness will always be changing because my circumstances are always changing.
- Truthfully, "discontentment is not a product of circumstances; it is a state of the soul." Proverbs 15:15 says, "All the days of the afflicted are evil: but he that is of a merry heart hath a continual feast" God says that I am to be content when I have food and clothing, and the amount I actually NEED of those items is not as great as I think it is.
- Debi stated that the old adage is true, practice truly does make perfect. The question is, what am I practicing? Am I continually hitting the sour notes of discontent, bitterness, anger, frustration, hurt feelings, and the like? It won't take long before that is where I naturally turn. Everything will be filtered through the glasses of my negative, unthankful spirit, and I will be hard pressed to find happiness and joy in anything. The good news is that the opposite is true: the more I practice responses of gratitude and thankfulness, the easier those repsonses will become.
- Here are ways to practice those happy notes: Be thankful. Smile. Stop and laugh at the little things that steal my joy. Count my blessings and learn to be appreciative. Look for things for which I can be thankful.
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In summary: "You can practice joy and thanksgiving. Every day, every right response makes the fingers of your soul find the notes of joy and thanksgiving easier and easier [sic]."
Added note 7/28/06: I chose this photo because it makes me think of how a thankful spirit radiates beauty.
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