G R A T I T U D E - appreciation, acknowledgment, recognition, gratefulness, grace, thankfulness for the overwhelming majority of things that are going right in our lives.  Practicing this is constantly reminding ourselves that life is awesome just the way it is.  Instead of focusing on what we don't have.  The latter seems to be par for the course, in the United States and in most western countries I suspect.  The ethos of consumer capitalism is to keep us dissatisfied, always wanting more, there will never be enough stuff, or resources to produce it.  This phenomenon is grotesque considering more than 1,000,000,000(that's a billion)people on earth live on a dollar a day or less.  Recent world events remind us yet again that all we have, including our very lives could be destroyed in a flash.  So we might as well be happy for the time we get to spend in our present form.  The people of Japan have been in my thoughts daily.  Since becoming a father, the tragedy hits "home" in a different way, and I commit to living an extraordinary life with my partner and child while I am here.
    I think contentment is a good synonym for gratitude.  I think one of the greatest examples of contentment can be found in the Advaita Vedanta text called the Ashtavakra Gita.  The scripture is a dialogue between the sage Ashtavakra and his student King Janaka.  King Janaka comes to embody contentment in this text.  The latest translation I read is by Sanskrit scholar and Buddhist monk Lama Sumati Marut (http://www.lamamarut.org). I will share a few passages from this translation.

"Just as the one all pervading space exists both inside and outside the pitcher, so too does the eternal and pervasive ultimate exists in all beings. -1.20"

"One who knows for sure that suffering is in the mind and nowhere else is free from it and is always happy and at peace and all discontentment just melts away. -11.5"

"Realizing that truly there is nothing that is really ever done, when something arises that needs to be done, I just do it and stay happy. -13.3"

"I have often observed that the appearance of pleasant things and events are out of my immediate control.  So, not caring about whether the thing or event is agreeable or disagreeable, I just stay happy. -13.7"

"Not wishing for the end of the world nor minding it's continued existence, the fortunate one subsists on whatever comes his way and stays happy.-17.7"


There are 20 other such chapters full of this beautiful wisdom.  Next time you are feeling down and out, or like you need someTHING else, just find a copy of this text and read it until an understanding happens.  We would all be fortunate ones to understand this text.