Rebirth and Renewal

Today I am grateful for safe travels and for the excitement/hope my stepdaughter Emily has for her post-secondary school choice. I am also grateful for our dog Oliver. He cracks me up when he races around the house shaking himself off after a bath.

Happy Easter! Easter and spring are times of rebirth and renewal. Awakenings come in many different forms. This was a long winter in our neck of the woods. We've had snow cover for four solid months, and it is still hanging on. The rebirth of trees, leaves, and grass are still weeks away. My skin craves sun and fresh air after months of limited exposure.

We traveled south for this trip. Just four hours south. But it was enough to give us a taste of the rebirth of spring that hasn't made it's way this far north yet. Birds were more numerous and more vocal. The snow cover was mostly gone, and the brown earth held the promise of green grass. Friday it warmed into the sixties and we soaked it up, walking in our shirt sleeves around a lake that was coming back to full life. We even got out our swimsuits. Okay, so it was an indoor pool, but still. We thoroughly enjoyed the beautiful day we were gifted, and it kicked up our spring fever a few notches.

On Friday morning, my husband Darcy and I headed out for a run. We stepped out of our hotel right into the sunrise. Renewal indeed! A new day underway with such beauty and hope. A few minutes into our run, we ran across an overpass spanning an interstate highway. Cars zoomed by in both directions, leaving me a little disoriented. But it also left me with this thought: I wonder how many of those drivers and passengers were thinking about today as a new day? Many were probably on their way to work or travels for the Easter holiday weekend. Were they feeling renewed and refreshed, or stale and stagnant?

Habitual gratitude practice keeps me more on the side of renewed and refreshed than stale and stagnant.

Today is a new day. What do you plan to do with it?

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