a reminder post to myself

Last night I shared with my small group my ongoing battle with discontent.  (I kinda thought everyone struggled with it like I do, but apparently not so much...so, now I'm kinda thinking'..."Ah!  This might be worse than I thought!")  In any case, whether I am alone in it or not, it's an area that I need to work on, and I need to be reminded now and again about how powerful being grateful can be.  Now, I'm not talking about being all corny and fake, mustering up a fake smile and saying (through gritted teeth) "I'm really thankful that I have a constant stream of gross, icky water flowing through my basement, because I know God will use that gross, icky water to bring about good in my life"...  Nah, I'm just not gonna go there.  Because what I'm talking about isn't trying to 'gloss over' the less-than-fun stuff in life, and through some form of self-deception or something, trying make myself be thankful for every.single.thing., like say for instance stink bugs and snakes.  Nope; just saying I have been blessed with a LOT.  Really healthy kids.  Gorgeous flowers and trees and green grass outside my door.  And really great people in my life who I love.  I'm talking about actually remembering to appreciating those things, on days when I can be tempted to complain that the kids are too rammy and wild (at least they have the ability walk and talk and play, right?), the grass is too high, and frankly making us all sneezy and itchy (I could live in an inner city without a sprig of green in sight!), and that I've had my fill of relationship difficulties (at least I have friends and family in my life - there are some very lonely people in this world).  I'm pretty sure I've said all of this before.  Apparently I'm just very thick headed, and need to remind myself often.  And this is a good way for me to do it.  So if you're rolling your eyes right now and thinking, "Well, duh..." , or "you already said this stuff"...then, just go ahead and disregard this, and think of it as a post-it note to myself.  ;)