humor

DianaK

Appreciations Year Three: DAY 365!

Three years of writing daily appreciations. Wow! How lucky I am to have stumbled upon this practice. How grateful I am for the ways it has rewired my brain so it is now always on the lookout for what is good and lovely in the world. How thrilled I am to have found kindred spirits whose desire to look for the best, reframe things in the most positive light, and search out nuggets of joy, have helped me on my own path.

The past three years have been filled with incredible changes (and yes, challenges) some of which would have seemed insurmountable, unbearable if it weren’t for the constant stream of noticing what is beautiful. This practice has made is so much easier to see, even on darker days, how incredibly lucky I am to know the people I know. Wonderful, bright, funny, deeply loving and supportive, generous and kind people everywhere I turn. It has helped me notice how beautiful the wind sounds as it blows through leaves on trees, how intensely blue the sky can be, how powerful the sound of laughter is. Today, especially, I am grateful for gratitude. ❤

Also, coffee.

And new beginnings.

Delicious hamburgersAnd hamburgers that are “delicious” — and a daughter who understands my appreciation of well-placed “quotation marks” and will take photos of the best examples to send to me. 🙂

DianaK

Appreciations Year Three: Day 309

IMG_3065Another stunningly beautiful day, weather-wise. All these hours of sunshine are bliss to me!

Looking forward to more Ruby time today. Spending time with her fills my little heart right up!

The sweet interplay between Pam and me as we continue our appreciating in our daily, public way. I know there are days that I’ve been in a “mood” and have felt at loss for what I might appreciate… and so often on those days, re-reading Pam’s choices remind me of all the good things in my life that I’m just not (at that moment) noticing. How thrilling and wonderful to have such a bright, articulate, funny, dedicated friend going along for this ride! ❤

Taking a page from one of Pam’s recent entries, here’s a recap and commentary on this process: I’ve now written over 1,000 of these appreciations. There have been a lot of intense and challenging experiences along the way and I can’t even describe how grateful I am that I already had this practice in place when they came up. (Bwahahaha – I’m so grateful for my gratitude practice. So meta!)

Teaching my brain to go and look for what is pleasing about every day has helped me notice friendly, funny nurses, sweet and compassionate traffic cops, truly caring vets, and the deeply supportive, generous, patient, beautiful people I am lucky to call my friends. These people made all the hospital stays and recoveries, the grief from losing pets, the challenges of bill-paying and the days of not having enough energy to get out of bed SO. MUCH. BETTER. And though I do still have anxious days and frustrated days, mostly I am just aware that my life is an incredible gift filled with brilliant people and experiences. YOU are one of the people for whom I am profoundly, utterly, deeply appreciate and whom I dearly love. ❤ (No, don’t look around, I do mean YOU!)

What’s even more fun is that this practice has made the tough times seem not so bad, but it has also made the good times unbelievably fun! I laugh more, smile more, and truly savor those blissful moments — and then relive them in these posts and in retelling the stories — so I get double (or triple or quadruple…) the joy from each of those delightful experiences. What a gift! 😀

And finally, this practice has helped me to truly understand how deeply and completely I love coffee. 😉

DianaK

Year 1, Day 86: huge appreciation for HUGE

It will come as no surprise for you to learn that I appreciate HUGE Theater! Here are today’s reasons:

  1. It is one of the most open and welcoming theater communities I’ve ever encountered.
  2. People of all skill levels are encouraged to explore their creativity, stretch past their comfort levels to see what’s there, and to see an expanded version of themselves in the process.
  3. Honesty and humor color all the improv that happens there — and you can see this amazing live theater 6 nights a week!