Thanklessly Thankful

By Sarah Weintraub

​Thanksgiving.  A day our Founding Fathers set aside to celebrate the first meal between the Indians and the Pilgrims.  I’d like to propose, we change America into a thankful nation EVERY day, not just on a date designated as Thanksgiving. 

In the early years of my stepmom journey, I wasn’t very thankful, thankless actually.  Life was hard as a stepmom and I wanted everyone who gave me an ear to hear how hard.  Grumble, complain, moan, groan. All. The. Time.  Every. Day. It was my way of life.  It must have been horrible to be around me. 

I was THAT stepmom – the one who found fault with everything my stepkids Mom did, the one who expected my stepkids to act perfectly, the one who grumbled about clothes, yes clothing wars were my platform of complaint for quite a while.

I was THAT wife, THAT employee.  Never thankful, always expecting, never happy, always feeling like I deserved it.  Yep, that was me…the mirror is sometimes hard to face.

I can’t tell you when or how I started to change the thankless lifestyle to one of thankfulness.  I became intentional with my thank you’s, even if I didn’t feel thankful, I said it anyway.   Especially when I really wanted to say “Really? ”  Instead, I managed to stop my mouth from spewing the thankless words, the toxins and pollution, and forced it to produce a word that sounded a lot like thank you.

The amazing thing is a thankless thank you has turned into a thankful thank you.  As I became intentional at saying thank you, I was becoming intentional at actually being grateful for all things -holiday schedule changes – thankful we would be together anyway;   clothing wars – thankful there was a war over clothing instead of a war like in other countries; an extremely low annual raise – thankful I had a job still.

What happened?  How could I go from thankless to thankful?  My life hadn’t changed – still had the same battles, the same circumstances. 

In my pastor’s sermon today, I heard the answer.  He talked about being thankful as a Godly way of life.  Being thankful in EVERYTHING didn’t change my circumstance; however, it changed MY perspective and focus.  Do I still complain, um...yep, still human too. 

In a world so focused on me, me, me, I challenge all of us to focus on being thankful for the challenges of our lives, thankful for the tears, thankful for the step kids that try our patients, thankful for their Mom who teaches us how to be God’s vessels, thankful, thankful, thankful. 
It all starts with the thankless thank you.

In E.V.E.R.Y.T.H.I.N.G. (yes, EVERYTHING) give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. (I Thessalonians 5:18) 

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