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Gratitude is the understanding that many millions of things come together and live together and mesh together and breathe together in order for us to take even one more breath of air, that the underlying gift of life and incarnation as a living, participating human being is a privilege; that we are miraculously, part of something, rather than nothing. – David Whyte
Coincidentally, I encountered this quote shortly after hearing a lecture on happiness in which the speaker asserted that when we truly recognize our privilege, we readily feel enthusiastic and grateful about whatever we’re engaged in, work included.
It’s easy to forget to be grateful though, just as it’s natural to expect life to continue in roughly the way it always has, with ample clean air, water, food, electricity, safety, and everything else that supports us. Sometimes it’s not until we experience contrast that we recognize our privilege.
Having a period of sickness makes us appreciate our health. Smoky air makes us appreciate fresh air – and firefighters and rain. Traveling in an area with mediocre food options makes us appreciate farmers’ markets and well-stocked grocery stores. All of our adversity, including even our day-to-day micro-adversities, can become prompts to recognize what’s still working and good in our life. You can even try making a rule for yourself that every time you complain about something – even just to yourself – you follow it with a statement of gratitude.
When traffic is bad, what’s good? When there’s pain in your back, what parts of your body still work well and feel okay?
Of course, we don’t need to wait for suffering in order to pay attention to our gifts. It’s just that suffering – especially when it’s really painful – has a way of capturing our attention. The key is the paying attention, and we’re in the habit of letting our attention go to whatever’s loudest or most dramatic, like media, interpersonal conflict, and worry.
Sometimes we need to grab our attention and put it on something else. And when I say “sometimes” I mean virtually all the time – choosing intentionally what we’re putting our attention on. Might I recommend a good place to put it: on the total experience that is happening right here, right now. Your breath and the air entering and exiting your lungs. What it feels like in your body. What you’re currently engaged in. The land you’re sitting on. The beating of your heart. The sun illuminating the world. The soft clothes on your skin. The feeling of the earth’s gravity acting on you.
We want to feel spontaneous gratitude, the exalted kind that comes to us with strong emotion, rather than needing to prompt ourselves to think of something to be grateful for. But the chosen form isn’t any less real. And it has the same benefits of promoting happiness, broadening our perspective, and focusing our energy on good things.
I am grateful for you.
Love,
Peter & Everyone at the Dragontree
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[post_date] => 2022-09-01 21:45:46
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You are amazing. Let’s take it to the next level.
I am always delighted to get unsolicited positive feedback about our books and courses. I save it all in an ever-growing document. Originally, the purpose was to have an easy way to remind myself of the value of my work if I were ever questioning my purpose or having a moment of low self-esteem. Eventually I realized that I don’t build up a tolerance to positive feedback; even if I glanced at these messages every day it wouldn’t stop having a beneficial effect on my consciousness.
When I was last looking at these notes, I was struck by how amazing people are. Yes, they needed some help to get to the next level and they felt our guidance made a difference, but they were invariably awesome to begin with.
While some of them went looking for assistance because of a sense that their lives were dysfunctional, many of them clearly recognized that things were already pretty great – and they also saw room to grow and improve.
One woman wrote to us that she had a thriving clothing import business when she got our Dreambook. In the self-exploration section, she realized she desired an avenue for greater creative expression. She set a goal, identified all the steps involved, followed through, and within a year she was receiving the first shipment of clothes she had designed herself!
Another Dreambook user told us it empowered her to move to Hawaii. She wrote, “My soul thrives there!” For decades she had visited and thought of it as a magical place … but only for vacations. It didn’t seem possible to live there full time. But, she said, “The book asked, ‘What would make life feel ridiculously fun?’ and I wrote, ‘Living in Hawaii’ and suddenly it was on the table and I started facing my excuses.”
She realized the potential quality-of-life impact it could have for her, so she mapped out the logistics. She asked the thriving Dragontree community, “What do you think?” And one by one, all of her obstacles disappeared. “Someone knew of a cool place to live – on a cacao farm! Someone else connected me with a job. Another person was moving from Hawaii back to the mainland to take care of her mother and she gave me all of her furniture – and some chickens!”
What are the critical factors in leveling up? Chances are, you don’t need to win the lottery or receive some other external windfall. It starts with having a vision of what “next level” would look like. The Dreambook provides the framework – all you need to do is fill in the blanks and follow through. Our 2023 edition comes out soon and it’s the best version ever. Check it out here!
Also, I highly recommend keeping some sort of file like the one I described above. Whenever you receive a positive message, whether as an email, text, social media comment, or birthday card . . . copy it, screenshot it, take a picture of it, or print it and stick it in a document, onto or dreamboard, or in a folder. It’s like stocking a medicine cabinet with bottles that will never go empty (plus it won’t upset your stomach).
Be well,
Peter
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After two years of studying plant and soil sciences, my favorite professor, Dr. Barker, offered me a job on the University of Massachusetts farm. Whereas my previous jobs had been things like bagging groceries and washing dishes, this was the first time I was getting paid to do something I was interested in, and under the supervision of someone I looked up to.
I was nervous when I showed up at Bowditch Hall on my first day. Dr. Barker, a white-haired man with a country drawl, introduced me to his assistant, Kathy. Then he handed me the keys to a faded old, blue truck and asked me, “Ever driven a three-on-the-tree?” I had never driven any kind of truck before, much less one with the gearshift on the steering column, but I learned quickly as I drove the three of us – with lots of jerking and stalling – out to the farm.
Standing at the edge of a freshly plowed field, Dr. Barker explained that we were going to use stakes and twine to mark out rows for planting seeds. Kathy and I got to work while he watched. The only trouble was, while I had stakes, a mallet, and a ball of twine, I didn’t have anything to cut the twine with. I thought maybe I had spaced out when someone explained where to find a knife or scissors. Or maybe the professor had told me to bring my own knife and I had forgotten. I was too uncomfortable to say anything.
Wondering if there was some way I could proceed with my task without a cutting tool, I pounded the first stake into the ground. I tied one end of the twine around it, walked the length of the field, pounded in another stake, wrapped the twine around that stake, pulled it taut, and then I just squatted there for a few moments. I considered trying to gnaw through it with my teeth, but dismissed the idea as totally unprofessional. Finally, at the risk of appearing unprepared, I called out to Kathy, who was a dozen paces away, “Do you have a knife?”
“Huh?” she turned around and squinted at me in the bright sun. “Oh.” She ambled over, fished around in her pocket, and passed me a pink disposable lighter.
I interpreted this unexpected response to mean, “I don’t have a knife, but I can see what you need there. You’re going to have to burn through the twine with this. At the ends of every row.” She gave me the lighter in such a matter-of-fact way that I thought it would be too weird to ask for a different explanation.
So, feeling like I didn’t have enough hands, I held the twine straight out from the stake, positioned the flame beneath it, and tried to shield it from the wind with my leg. It blew out a couple times, but I eventually managed to burn through it. Meanwhile Dr. Barker had wandered over to observe me and remarked, “That is the strangest way of doing that I have ever seen.”
“Um. I didn’t have a knife,” I said sheepishly.
“Well, I’ve got a knife you can use.”
“Me too,” offered Kathy.
And that’s how, on the first day of my first important job, I believed I must have convinced my boss that I was an absolute idiot. By the way, if you’re wondering why Kathy handed me that lighter, these were the days when smoking was still quite common. She was a smoker and must have thought I said, “Do you have a light?”
The whole thing turned out to be a good lesson for me. By avoiding an uncomfortable conversation, I ended up in even more discomfort.
I resolved to speak up and break through the tension of misunderstanding in the future. I can’t say I’ve always done this, because it takes bravery, and sometimes I chose to stay in my (dis-)comfort zone. But I can say that I’ve never regretted it. Usually there’s an immediate diffusion of tension, and even when there isn’t, at least the truth is out and there’s an opening for resolution. This is especially true when we bring an attitude of curiosity and aim to understand the other person.
Is there anywhere in your life where you’ve left something unsaid because of your resistance to the discomfort of speaking those words and the feelings that may follow? I want to challenge you to make a communication this week that takes you a bit outside your comfort zone. Even if you have to say, “I’m really nervous about saying this” or you have to hold a friend’s hand while doing it, it’s worth it.
Be well,
Peter
[post_title] => Uncomfortable Conversations: Diffuse the Discomfort by Speaking Up
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Gratitude is the understanding that many millions of things come together and live together and mesh together and breathe together in order for us to take even one more breath of air, that the underlying gift of life and incarnation as a living, participating human being is a privilege; that we are miraculously, part of something, rather than nothing. – David Whyte
Coincidentally, I encountered this quote shortly after hearing a lecture on happiness in which the speaker asserted that when we truly recognize our privilege, we readily feel enthusiastic and grateful about whatever we’re engaged in, work included.
It’s easy to forget to be grateful though, just as it’s natural to expect life to continue in roughly the way it always has, with ample clean air, water, food, electricity, safety, and everything else that supports us. Sometimes it’s not until we experience contrast that we recognize our privilege.
Having a period of sickness makes us appreciate our health. Smoky air makes us appreciate fresh air – and firefighters and rain. Traveling in an area with mediocre food options makes us appreciate farmers’ markets and well-stocked grocery stores. All of our adversity, including even our day-to-day micro-adversities, can become prompts to recognize what’s still working and good in our life. You can even try making a rule for yourself that every time you complain about something – even just to yourself – you follow it with a statement of gratitude.
When traffic is bad, what’s good? When there’s pain in your back, what parts of your body still work well and feel okay?
Of course, we don’t need to wait for suffering in order to pay attention to our gifts. It’s just that suffering – especially when it’s really painful – has a way of capturing our attention. The key is the paying attention, and we’re in the habit of letting our attention go to whatever’s loudest or most dramatic, like media, interpersonal conflict, and worry.
Sometimes we need to grab our attention and put it on something else. And when I say “sometimes” I mean virtually all the time – choosing intentionally what we’re putting our attention on. Might I recommend a good place to put it: on the total experience that is happening right here, right now. Your breath and the air entering and exiting your lungs. What it feels like in your body. What you’re currently engaged in. The land you’re sitting on. The beating of your heart. The sun illuminating the world. The soft clothes on your skin. The feeling of the earth’s gravity acting on you.
We want to feel spontaneous gratitude, the exalted kind that comes to us with strong emotion, rather than needing to prompt ourselves to think of something to be grateful for. But the chosen form isn’t any less real. And it has the same benefits of promoting happiness, broadening our perspective, and focusing our energy on good things.
I am grateful for you.
Love,
Peter & Everyone at the Dragontree
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