Gratitude should be your attitude

My little sister Melanie lives in Montana with her husband and 7 of the most amazing and beautiful children.  I don't get to see them enough and some of that is my fault. She is so amazing to me because of the fantastic mother and optimistic person she always is. She is so nice all the time and super resourceful. She was recently here for thanksgiving and I am always amazed at how she is with her kids.

Last week I received a card in the mail from Melanie.  I was a super sweet note just telling me how proud she was of me and how she admired me. The note was so sweet in made me cry. It also made my week and had me thinking how often do we take the time to say something nice to someone, this includes ourselves.  Then this morning I had some random stranger tell me I looked nice today. This made me smile and thank the person. I walked into the store and was instantly uplifted by his kind words. We never know what a kind word for someone does.


This made me think am I the type of person who has gratitude for people and lets them know that I am thankful they are in my life or do I just take them for granted. I hope that if I am not I grow to be a thankful person.  I have some amazing people in my life and I hope they know how much I am grateful and love them. I try to tell them as often as I think about it but I am sure there are people that I don't tell I love and appreciate them often enough.

I once had an experience where I had a great friend go into the hospital for brain surgery. I felt really impressed to go visit her before she went in the next day for surgery. I visited her and let her know that I loved her and was grateful for all the things she had done for me growing up. I told her how much I appreciated her being there to listen to me.  She went in to surgery and it seemed to work OK. Not very long after her tumor grew and we lost her just a few short months later.  I look back on that and was so grateful I had taken the time to visit her personally.  Since then I try to not any thought like that pass without acting on it. Several times it has lead me to do things like send notes to people or go to dinner with friends. I will never have any regrets because I  know it is best to act on that thought. There is a reason for that thought. I feel that we should always be grateful for those in your lives and let them know because no one is promised tomorrow.