And, with your childlike curiosity you probably asked...”Auntie, why are you crying? Are you sad?”
It wasn’t until you were an adult that you finally understood what tears of joy meant, and perhaps felt like. Maybe something so overwhelming in your life brought a tear to you eye, and you felt what it was like to be overwhelmed with joy.
But today, I woke up full of gratitude and I felt my own tear of joy welling up inside of me for almost no reason at all, just a nice word from a friend. And perhaps, yes for a moment, I thought I might be loosing my marbles! But I also had a memory.... My beautiful Gramma, so full of love each day, would cry at Grace. Not some big elaborate wedding, or overwhelming life experience… just saying Grace.
I understood it then, I felt it then, and have cryed tears of joy in my life. But today I felt a complete knowing… that feeling of being so full of gratitude that when you, even if briefly, truly understand even those smallest blessings, and you feel SO full at that moment, that to be any more grateful completely overfills your cup. I suppose your gratitude cup!
When you witness someone so full of gratitude that they have a tear of joy at even the saying of grace, you are truly in the presence of someone who is truly grateful, truly understanding of all that they know in life that there is to be grateful for. And it’s viral. It’s contagious. You can feel the gratitude in the room, you can’t help it. It’s a great thing to spread.
So I share my personal story, so that maybe today, you can see something it is that you can be grateful for and say Thank you. And feel true gratitude. It doesn’t have to be grand, or great. In fact, it’s the littlest things that sometimes carry the biggest gifts to be thankful for.
When you can no longer fill yourself with gratitude, you just may bring up a tear at Grace tonight.
