It is easy, after success has happened, to think in retrospect that it was inevitable and happened without effort. I was reminded of this when thinking about the young saplings that we have been nurturing in our front yard to provide landscaping. In my first round of (unsuccessful!!) planting, I didn’t take good care of the young trees as required: I failed to water them regularly and they died. In the next round of planting, my wife helped and we were more diligent and persistent; the trees are now thriving. As they grow and become more clearly established, despite my knowledge of the history, it’s easy for me to think they were always going to get to this stage—that it’s natural that they would survive and thrive. But I know from my failure that it was not inevitable and it only happened because of the work that was done to ensure they could establish themselves.
This is true with many things in life: that somebody works
very hard to nurture and establish an idea, a project, a program, or a sapling
of any kind, and yet, after that work has borne fruit, we feel like that
success was inevitable—and because of that we fail to give heartfelt thanks,
appreciation and even celebration to those who contributed to it.
It’s so easy to take
things for granted. Sometimes we fail to notice the effort and success in the
first place and sometimes we recognize it at first, but then become numb to it.
I first perceived my tendency to do the latter when, as a kid, I brought home a
poster of the castle at Disneyland. I hung it on the wall next to my bed, loved
looking at it, and was so grateful for it. But after a few weeks I realized
that I was hardly “seeing” it—it had blended in and become “just part of the
room.” The same can happen with a favorite song or toy or meal. It may go too
far to say “Familiarity breeds contempt,” but it can definitely breed
complacency.
Worse than that, things that are readily available can breed a sense of entitlement. I’ve often thought that the adage, “If you give a man a fish for a day…” might yield another lesson if you extended it to: “If you give a man a fish each day for three days he will be expecting one on the fourth day. And if you give a man a fish each day for six days, by the seventh he will be complaining that all you ever bring is fish.” I think each of us has the tendency to react that way—it’s just human nature. It’s the responsibility of the receiver to remain grateful and not become entitled, and of the giver to try to avoid enabling that.
I can’t overstate the importance of giving thanks and
feeling and showing gratitude. Sometimes that requires generosity and “leaning
in” to the good intentions and efforts, despite the gift—the old adage “Don’t
look a gift horse in the mouth” (checking its teeth is a simple way to know if
a horse is old) reminds us not to be critical of gifts, but to at least
appreciate the thought. It’s life-giving for givers to feel authentically
appreciated for their gifts of thoughtfulness and effort. And authenticity,
including recognition of details, is critical— perfunctory, formulaic
“gratitude” can actually be insulting, and not uplifting. I expect we have all
received half-hearted thanks for a gesture or gift and know how very
unsatisfying it is.
It is just as important—for their own sakes—for receivers to appreciate gifts and feel gratitude. Gratitude transforms how we see and interact with the world and everyone in it—it’s us acknowledging that someone else cared enough to do something nice for us, which makes us feel valued. Research out of Harvard Medical School tells us that,
gratitude is strongly and consistently associated with greater happiness. Gratitude helps people feel more positive emotions, relish good experiences, improve their health, deal with adversity, and build strong relationships.
Ingratitude and entitlement, on the other hand, are the
antitheses of thankfulness. Entitlement assumes things will be given, feels
slighted when they aren’t, and is very willing to criticize the extent or
quality of what is given. Entitlement provides no joy to either the receiver or
the giver. I believe that each of us has the capacity to feel entitled and that
we tend towards it most in times of plenty—it’s related to expectations, which
I discuss in another chapter. Saint Ignatius of Loyola wrote on the cost of
entitlement and ingratitude: “it is the failure to recognize the good things,
the graces, and the gifts received. As such, it is the cause, beginning, and
origin of all evil.”
Like forgiveness,
thankfulness is most immediately valuable to the people giving and receiving it,
but it also defines a family, community, nation, or world. Just imagine the
difference between a society in which people “feel more positive emotions,
relish good experiences, improve their health, deal with adversity, and build
strong relationships” and a society in which people lack those things. I
believe that gratitude may be the most important attribute defining a culture.
And it’s an immediately actionable behavior each of us can work on improving
every day.
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