Not only are we on an adventure as a family, doing full-time RV travel, I’m on a journey of my own. I made a promise to myself to start practicing gratitude, and to spend a moment daily to acknowledge three things I’m grateful for that day. I try to write them down, but to be honest, I get lazy, and sometimes will just say them out loud to put them out there in the universe. I takes no time. It costs nothing. There’s no reason not to do it. Everyone has time to practice gratitude and be grateful.
I’ve been conscious and grateful for many things along this adventure, but there’s three reoccurring themes that hold a big space in my “gratitude library”…
Three Things I’m Grateful For:
- SLOWWWW MORNINGS. No alarms. No start-times. No rushing. No impatient tones with my kid that I will later regret. More time for snuggles and morning chats. We get out of bed when we want to, not when we have to. We drink our coffee in bed, or outside in the morning sun. This is the biggest gift this adventure could’ve given us, and we didn’t see it coming.
- FREEDOM TO GO WITH THE FLOW. We can change up our day’s plan if we want to. If we’re too tired, or Rocky’s not feelin’ it. We can stop and play in a park for as long as he wants, without having to rush back, or on to the next thing we have to do. We can have our meals at any time, or can push back his nap if he’s having too much fun playing. We make up our day’s plan as we go now, and it can change, and we can adapt. Though, I have to say, it took us some time to get to this pace. We were so programmed to stick to what we had planned for the day, even after a few months on the road. We would still catch ourselves saying “but I thought we were going to do this…” and then we’d reflect and respond with “…I guess it doesn’t matter”. Now, we’ve allowed ourselves to totally turn that impulse off. I never knew how much lighter you can feel when you don’t have to stick to a strict schedule.
- TIME TOGETHER AND BEING PRESENT IN IT. It is not lost on us that this time will come to an end, especially for me. Having an adult child already, I have seen how fast the time can go. Since Rocky was born in 2020, I’ve been home with him full-time, and then part-time. The time of him being a baby, and then a toddler, is coming to an end. Next September, he will start school, and I will be back at work full-time. This time together, totally together, is a precious gift. On being present in it: it feels as though we’re all getting to know each other all over again, or in new ways. Without any of those to-do lists or schedules to stick to, we’re really present in our time together. We can better observe one another’s behaviours and actions, and take time to reflect on them and respond. We are able to better see who we really are, and love and appreciate one another. We can cherish each other and better learn how we work as a family.
Like I said, there’s an abundance of things for me to be grateful for these days, but these are just the top three at this particular time of my big adventure and my journey of practicing gratitude.
Want to Start Practicing Gratitude?
If you’ve ever considered practicing gratitude, or mindfulness, I highly recommend it. It can be very healing, enlightening, and if you stick with it, you will feel change, and the change is GOOD. The easiest way to is start a journal, either paper or in your phone, and just write down three things you were grateful for that day. Be specific. They can be your morning coffee, your evening bath, your midday walk… anything. So start, and keep going. If you’re too lazy to write it down, say it out loud. Try it out and let me know how it goes! Some easy reading on it can be found on mindful.org.
Grateful for you reading!
