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Well, this is the first time I am writing a gratitude list. August took me on a roller-coaster ride; lots of reasons to be grateful for and some very challenging instances that eventually made me stronger; but in all, it was a very important month that saw soaring highs and plunging lows in equal measure.
Things have been going amazingly well for me since I took a break from active work life. I was taking on things in my own pace, dedicating time to things I liked to do and most importantly focusing all my energy on my farm. This month marked the most important occasion of all – my farm house grihapravesam (house warming) which was a milestone event in my farming journey.
This was sort the culmination of lots of dreaming and lots of hard work. The house meant we could spend more time on the farm and do more productive work than we could do before. And that’s why the completion of our farmhouse was a major celebratory event for us. And for this reason this month will be etched in my memory forever. This was sort of the highlight of this month; all the hard work, all the planning and execution, everything coming together on this day with an important celebration; not just any celebration, celebration of dreams coming true…It was not just any house for us; it was years of romanticizing the notion of living on a farm.
We finally set up the vegetable garden patch the way we imagined in our mind. The design of the patch had been on paper for months; color-coding done for where each plant would go, comparing the companion planting chart and the seasons charts and weeks of poring into those charts to make sense of it and learning from various resources. Finally when we turned our raised beds in our backyard space into a reality, it was definitely special. The seed sowing, caring for the seedling at home like little babies, the careful transplanting and seeing them take roots in the farm, then weeding and protecting from pests yes…a lot of work and a lot of thought and a lot of day dreaming went into this. And so it was mighty special, you see.
Now coming to the not so good part of the month; let’s just say somehow there are people who just find the most opportune time to crash in and ruin everything. So just like that something that could have been a beautiful memory of all the hard work taking fruition, turned into a hurtful moment.
It took me some time and lots of copious tears to realize that this event too had an important part to play. The mind played reruns of the episode and flash backs of times when we had bend over backwards for this person; and it took some time through lot of introspection to realize why it had happened.
There comes a time when you have to stop crossing oceans for people who wouldn’t even jump a puddle for you ― Anonymous
Yes. That’s what it made me realise. Sometimes things happen and we initially keep wallowing in it wondering only about the why(s) and how(s), but when you choose to pause and take a closer look, you will see that you needed it. Not deserved it, but needed it – to see the true picture.
Some incidents happen in life just to make you realize that there will be people who will take advantage of your politeness and kindness and they are never grateful for all that you had done for them. That’s when it hits us that probably somewhere down the line we had forgotten to draw boundaries; for people to know that they can’t take you for granted or over-step the boundaries.
So this most certainly taught me some very important life lessons; for which I will be forever grateful. We all need reality checks from time to time.
I am a dreamer; and I always take the high road to bypass any unnecessary brawls; ignoring snide remarks just to not rock the boat or ruffle the feathers. I am someone who looks forward to a nice, warm atmosphere and don’t like to be a part of tension-ridden situations. This incident just knocked me over and made me sit up and take stock of things.
Okay, so coming to gratitude; Yes. Deepest gratitude. For everything that happened, good and bad. It made me see the reality. One thing I realised by practicing gratitude is that it makes you look at bad things in a new light; as if they were custom designed to teach you tough lessons. And by doing so, it really helps one calm down and accept things by making them easier to handle.
I had always practiced gratitude by counting my blessing and saying my thanks every night but have never written it down till now. But writing it down has really helped and so, I think I am finally on to this gratitude list thing…It surely is something!
Do try if you have never done this before and if you are someone who writes gratitude list all the time, then you know what I mean don’t you!
I am taking my Alexa rank to the next level with #Blogchatter.
#lazysummerdiarieswriting
This is my #Post3 for the 2nd week of #MyFriendAlexa campaign. Do check out my other two posts written for week 1 here –
https://kalpavrikshafarm.wordpress.com/2018/09/01/17-summersmyfriendalexa/
https://kalpavrikshafarm.wordpress.com/2018/09/05/teachers-day-and-what-it-means-to-me-myfriendalexa/
Linking up with Vidya Sury’s Gratitude Circle https://vidyasury.com/ and Corinne Rodrigues #MondayMusings
