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Brett and Kate McKay
What prevents us from showing our gratitude more freely?
Gratitude is inextricably tied up with the virtue of humility. Gratitude
shows that we’re paying attention to the acts of service people perform for
us and that we truly understand how those acts make our life better, easier,
and happier. The ungrateful man is callous; he’s come to think that all the
good things that happen to him and all the service rendered him are an
automatic response to his impeachable awesomeness. He deserves all that
stuff and more. Thus, he never takes notice of the good things that happen
to him. And he’s never really happy with what he has. He deserves only the
best in life, and concentrates solely on the ways in which this ideal hasn’t
been met.
The grateful man is a humble man. He has no illusions of his grandeur.
He knows that bad things happen to good people. He knows how easily a
rally can turn into a slump. He knows how much worse off many others are
than he is. He understands the sacrifices others make on his behalf. And he
deeply, deeply appreciates them.
Personal Gratitude
Gratitude is not simply something that we externally share with others.
It is an attitude that we live with every day. Some of the unhappiest men
I’ve met in my life have also been the most ungrateful. They could only see
the things that were wrong with their life, choosing to concentrate on the
things they wished they had and wished had happened but didn’t. Their
whining corrupted their soul. On the flip side, some of the happiest men
I’ve know are the ones that truly embraced the virtue of gratitude. Some of
them were dirt poor, but they were still so grateful for what little they did
have. They focused not on the things they lacked, but on all the things they
had going for them.
Some people think if they had more stuff or better luck, then they would
magically have more gratitude. But the number of your material possessions
or relationships will have no effect on your attitude. Once you got
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