{"id":347,"date":"2012-11-20T22:42:20","date_gmt":"2012-11-21T04:42:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/katrinamcghee.com\/?p=347"},"modified":"2017-04-09T13:49:26","modified_gmt":"2017-04-09T18:49:26","slug":"go-beyond-the-gratitude-post","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lovingonme.com\/2017\/2012\/11\/20\/go-beyond-the-gratitude-post\/","title":{"rendered":"Go Beyond the Gratitude Post!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-349 size-medium\" title=\"Give Thanks\" src=\"https:\/\/lovingonme.com\/2017\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/istock_000017887217medium.jpg?w=300\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"214\" \/>When I started the blog I thought Loving Others would be about giving back. I wanted to highlight organizations doing amazing things so that we could partner in making a difference. I&#8217;ve done some of that and will likely continue to share opportunities for impact. But lately, I\u2019ve been thinking maybe Loving Others should be about, well\u2026learning to love others. Not the noun love that describes the warm fuzzy feeling, but the verb <b>love that requires action<\/b>.<\/p>\n<p>Perhaps what triggered this line of thinking are the wonderful Facebook posts I wake up to each morning expressing our gratitude! Oh my goodness, we are all so blessed! We are thankful for our families, our friends, our jobs, our peace of mind, and most especially our faith. I have to tell you it is a welcome change from the rhetoric and negativity from this past political season.\u00a0 (Indeed, one would question if we are the same people \u2013 but that\u2019s a different blog.)<\/p>\n<p>It has me wondering, what are we doing to express our gratitude? Is a Facebook post shared with friends enough? What does gratitude even mean? Most of us have used the word since we were children. In fact, I used to talk to Brandon all the time about an \u201cattitude of gratitude\u201d. Primarily that lesson was about learning to be grateful for the kindness of others and expressing that by saying thank you. But, as I look at the dictionary now, I realize that is really only half the equation.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><b>Gratitude is defined as <\/b><b>the quality of being thankful; readiness to show appreciation for and <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">to return kindness<\/span>.<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Hmm\u2026that means we can\u2019t just say we\u2019re grateful; we\u2019ve got to live it. Gratitude is about our attitude and action. <b>The surest way you know a person is truly grateful for what God has done for them is by what they are doing for others<\/b>.<\/p>\n<p>As we enjoy the holidays with family and friends I challenge us to go beyond the talking and start living our gratitude by loving others. Not just for the obvious, but also for what we all too often take for granted. You know, the people that make our life easier but we scarcely even notice as we go throughout our day.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The janitor who empties the trash in our office.<\/li>\n<li>The bagger who packs our groceries.<\/li>\n<li>The attendant cleaning the bathroom at the airport or store.<\/li>\n<li>The people, who mow our lawns, deliver our mail and pick up our trash.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>It\u2019s amazing how we go through life seeing people, and yet never really see them. We know they\u2019re there, but in an off hand sort of way \u2013 like the picture hanging on our living room wall that we rarely stop to look at or appreciate. In the busyness of our lives, we sometimes allow people to become just part of the landscape.<\/p>\n<p>For a few days let\u2019s forget about random acts of kindness and instead be intentional in our gratitude. <b>One of the greatest gifts we can give a person is to let them know \u201cI see you and appreciate you<\/b>.\u201d Let\u2019s stop with the drive-by thank you and really take a moment to show love and concern for those we\u2019ve taken for granted. Adding a monetary tip to that would be nice, but I suspect that the investment of your time and genuine gratitude will have a meaningful impact all on its own.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s such a little thing on our part to expand our field of vision to see beyond ourselves, but to the person we\u2019re acknowledging it may make a world of difference. After all, at the end of the day don\u2019t we all just want to be seen, appreciated and loved?<\/p>\n<p>Loving on Me as I Love You!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When I started the blog I thought Loving Others would be about giving back. I wanted to highlight organizations doing amazing things so that we could partner in making a difference. I&#8217;ve done some of that and will likely continue to share opportunities for impact. But lately, I\u2019ve been thinking maybe Loving Others should be [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":12463,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sharing_disabled":false,"switch_like_status":false,"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":""},"categories":[204998050,114917237],"tags":[922,50634,5411,44096762,495],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/lovingonme.com\/2017\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/11\/istock_000017887217medium-1.jpg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4eAxC-5B","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lovingonme.com\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lovingonme.com\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lovingonme.com\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lovingonme.com\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lovingonme.com\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=347"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/lovingonme.com\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13950,"href":"https:\/\/lovingonme.com\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347\/revisions\/13950"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lovingonme.com\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12463"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lovingonme.com\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lovingonme.com\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lovingonme.com\/2017\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}