Grateful, Even Here

I've been struggling with gratitude lately.

Not because there is nothing good happening in my life. There is.

The problem is that almost every good thing seems to come with an asterisk.

I might get a job—but I need a car to get there.

I might get more hours—but the job I can get to doesn't give me enough of them.

I might get financial assistance—but the payment gets delayed.

I might get to see my kids—but only some of them.

I might make progress in my own life—but that progress also forces me to confront things I'd rather not look at.

It's not that I can't see the good.

It's that I keep seeing the problem attached to it.

And lately, I've been wondering if that's part of what I need to change.

Maybe I don't need to wait until my life is going well before I learn how to be grateful.

Maybe I need to learn how to be grateful while it's still hard.

Last week was a pretty normal week. Work, Whitestone, and more work. I'm only working about 18 hours a week right now. That's not where I want to be, but it gets me out of the house. It gives me somewhere to go and something useful to do.

I talk to my older two kids on the phone a few times a week. I haven't seen my oldest in about a year, and I haven't seen my second daughter since mid-August. The situation with my kids still isn't completely resolved.

And there's another example.

I had an interview at a warehouse about ten days ago. The interview went well. I didn't get the job.

I don't know why. I can only wonder whether somebody Googled me.

My past still causes me problems.

I also applied for a job with FedEx as a package handler. The system conditionally approved me, and I completed the background check. Apparently that's finished too, and now I'm waiting to find out what happens next.

That's potentially good news.

Except it's part-time.

And it's located somewhere that the bus isn't really practical, especially with the very early start time.

I need a car.

I can't get around that.

So even when something looks like a possible step forward, I immediately find the problem attached to it.

I could get a job. But I need transportation.

I could get more hours. But I need a job that I can actually get to.

I could get financial assistance. But even that became complicated.

I applied for Ontario Works in mid-August after my bike broke down and couldn't be repaired. I was approved, and my file was supposed to be transferred to the city.

Then the payment didn't come.

I called. I got transferred to the wrong person. I got transferred again. I left a voicemail. Eventually somebody got back to me and told me that a supervisor needed to review my file.

The payment was eventually reinstated.

But because of the Truth and Reconciliation Day holiday, I won't actually receive it until October 2.

Ugh.

Sometimes somebody else's problem becomes my problem very quickly.

And that's where I find myself struggling with gratitude.

I'm not trying to pretend these things aren't difficult. They are.

I'm trying to learn how to acknowledge the good things without allowing the problems surrounding them to completely erase them.

That's something I'm also trying to do with myself.

One of the things I've been working on is continuing to identify the parts of my life that cause me concern and actually doing something about them.

A leader at Whitestone gave a testimony that I couldn't ignore. It challenged me to look back at the last four years of my life and be honest about what has changed—and what hasn't.

There have been some significant improvements. I'm not going to minimize those.

But I also realized that there are things I'm still uncomfortable with.

My relationship with food.

My relationship with sexuality.

I'm going to write more about those things in another post, so I don't want to turn this one into that story. But I will say this much:

I hastily ordered the Sex Addicts Anonymous book—the Green Book—and started reading through it.

It's a secular 12-step program, as most of them are, but a lot of it hit home.

I realized something important.

My problems may have become unmanageable in 2022, but I don't like where I am today either.

I don't want to learn how to manage a pornography problem.

I want it gone.

There is still work to do.

And then Sunday happened.

Sunday was a hard day.

I had absolutely no desire to go to church.

I went anyway.

I talked to a few longtime members about what I've been dealing with. I cried. We prayed.

Then something happened.

One of the ushers asked the person in charge to take the day off because she was tired. The lady in charge said she was needed because there wasn't anybody else to fill the role.

Without really thinking about it, I said I would do it.

I was in a bad place. I thought maybe if I could do something useful and keep my mind off everything for a while, I might feel better.

So I did.

I stood at the door and welcomed people into church.

It wasn't something I had planned on doing. I had originally been content to do things in the background. I still am.

But my pastor has told me that he thinks I would make a good greeter or usher.

And honestly?

I enjoyed it.

There was something strangely satisfying about being the first person people from the congregation saw when they walked through the door.

I was still dealing with all the same problems.

Nothing had been fixed.

But I was doing something useful.

And by the end of the service, I felt better.

Maybe this is what small beginnings look like.

Not a new life.

Not everything suddenly falling into place.

Just showing up.

Serving somebody.

Taking the next step.

Doing the work.

Seeing a little bit of movement where there wasn't any before.

The Bible says:

“Do not despise these small beginnings…” — Zechariah 4:10 (NLT)

I'm beginning to understand why that verse matters to me right now.

Because I think I have a tendency to look at something small and immediately ask why it isn't bigger.

I'm working, but only 18 hours.

I'm applying for jobs, but I don't have one yet.

I might have another job opportunity, but it's part-time and I have a transportation problem.

I'm working on myself, but I still have things I need to change.

I may get to see two of my kids again, but I still can't see the other two.

I keep looking at the gap between where I am and where I want to be.

Maybe I need to start paying more attention to the ground I've already covered.

And then, this week, I got another small win.

I received an email from my older kids' social worker.

They want to start setting up visits.

I'm happy.

Really happy.

I get to see my older two kids again.

But even here, there are complications. I still can't see my younger two, and there doesn't appear to be a resolution for that yet.

So I'm trying to resist the temptation to let what I don't have erase what I do.

I get to see two of my kids again.

That's something.

It's not everything.

But it's something.

And maybe that's where gratitude starts for me.

Not with pretending that everything is okay.

Not with ignoring the things that still hurt.

Not with convincing myself that the problems aren't real.

I don't have to call everything good.

I don't have to pretend everything is going to work out exactly the way I want it to.

I just have to be willing to recognize the good when I see it.

I still don't have a car.

I still don't have the full-time job I'm looking for.

I still have unresolved issues with my kids.

I still have things in myself that I need to change.

None of that disappeared this week.

But I went to church when I didn't want to go.

I served.

I had people pray with me.

I'm doing some uncomfortable work on myself.

And I'm going to get to see two of my kids again.

A few months ago, I probably would have looked at all of that and focused on everything that was still missing.

I'm trying not to do that anymore.

Maybe that's what gratitude looks like for me right now.

Not gratitude because everything is better.

Gratitude even here.