How Loss Can Make Us More Grateful At Thanksgiving

As Thanksgiving approaches, I find myself feeling especially grateful. I’m grateful for my health, for my endlessly fascinating and fulfilling work, for my wonderful friends and most especially for my family. More than ever this year, I appreciate the fact that I’ll be sitting around the table with my family members, enjoying a festive meal.

Interestingly, I didn’t always look forward to Thanksgiving. Sometimes I approached the holiday with some trepidation. The reason for this was that not all of my family members have been the easiest people to get along with.

I’m sure I’m not the only person who can get frustrated by the odd family member. Just because we’re related, it doesn’t necessarily mean that we’re compatible.

Sometimes, family members have differing political views; sometimes there’s jealousy among them; sometimes someone has done something that the other person finds it hard to forgive. Family members are capable of holding on to resentments for a long time.

In my family, my issue has always been with a couple of people who’d get overly excitable when it comes to our around-the-table discussions. I’ve never liked it when people started raising their voices.

Interestingly, though, all my misgivings have evaporated this year and I’m eagerly anticipating the Thanksgiving meal. The reason is simple. In the past few years we’ve lost a number of our loved ones.

One was under 20; another was over 100. Some were lost to illness or to old age; one was taken in a tragic accident. All of this loss has dramatically shifted my thinking and the things that used to bother me about my family just don’t bother me anymore.

After a loss or a series of losses, it’s not uncommon that we look at things differently. When we lose loved ones we’ll very often value our remaining family members that much more. We’ll start to put aside the petty grievances and personality clashes and we’ll become more able to accept each-other as we are.

Of course, if you have family members who are abusive or toxic, there’s probably nothing that would make you want to spend time with these individuals, over the holidays or at any other time of the year.

I’m talking more about the little things that aggravate us about our family members and how these minor issues lose their importance when the numbers of our loved ones start to dwindle.

Some of us find it hard to feel gratitude. We compare ourselves to others and tend to see our situation as inferior. There’s always someone out there who has more of what we want whether it’s money, fame, success or love.

We can feel chronically dissatisfied with our lives and when Thanksgiving comes along, gratitude is the last thing on our minds.

One cure for this chronic sense of dissatisfaction is to put things into perspective. We usually compare ourselves to those who appear to be doing better than us but we seldom think about all the people who might be doing worse. We complain about what we’re lacking but we don’t consider how many people are lacking even more than we are.

Sometimes, what makes us grateful over the holidays is not having more but having less. The experience of loss makes us take stock of our lives and appreciate what we do have.

If we’ve had a financial setback, we’re grateful to have a home; if we’ve had a health scare, we’re grateful to be able to celebrate with our loved ones. And if we’ve lost loved ones, we’re grateful for everyone who’s still with us.

The constant stream of images we view every day online makes it easy for us to get into the habit of comparing ourselves to each-other and feeling that we constantly need “more.” We can get caught up in materialism, consumerism, how we look and what we wear.

We can start to feel bad about what we see as lacking in our lives. A loss or a series of losses can set our heads straight, shifting our priorities and helping us focus on the positive as opposed to what might be missing.

I miss the people in my life who’ve passed away in the last few years. Losing these people made me refocus on what really matters: the loving connections we have with each-other. Without these connections, everything else becomes meaningless.

If you’re having a hard time feeling grateful this Thanksgiving, perhaps it’s time for you to take stock and consider what’s most important in your life.

Maybe it’s time to appreciate your family members and spend some quality time with them. After the losses I experienced, the message was driven home that you never know how long you have with anyone, so enjoy their company now.

I suggest that instead of focusing on what you don’t have, this holiday season, you can get in touch with your gratitude about what you do have, including your family members. They may not be perfect people but unless they’re really toxic, I suggest that you enjoy your time with them and appreciate them for who they are.

Life is short and filled with surprises; not all of them pleasant. I suggest that you take every opportunity to celebrate the fact that you have a family to celebrate with.

Subscribe to my YouTube Channel to watch my series Moving into Autumn with Good Self-Care, where you’ll learn simple tips for taking the best care of yourself and your loved ones this fall season.

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