The Jars…

This summer, I decided to do an experiment. I’m calling it the “jars of truth.”  One is a jar with a label stating “Jar of Thankfulness” and underneath there is a verse “Give thanks in all things…” (1 Thess. 5:18).  Above the verse is a smiley face.  On the second jar, the “Jar of Ungratefulness” (frowny face), the verse “Out of the heart the mouth speaks…” (Luke 6:45) is written.  For the Thankfulness jar, there is a dish of white stones in front of it.  For the Ungratefulness jar, there are black stones (we got them for some sort of Chinese board game that we never learned how to play).  One stone for each noticed thought or word that is thankful or not.

There are several reasons for these jars.  The most important being, there was far too much complaining going on in the house.  In my family of origin, complaining is its own art form.  It goes hand in hand with the other practiced family traits of pessimism, skepticism, criticism and cynicism.  Negativity central.  And having two brothers here for the summer and my own self, I knew that ungratefulness would rob us of a truly enjoyable summer.  I was also noticing a trend of what I like to call “pre-complaining.”  That is complaining about something before it’s actually occurred.

Example: 

Me: We’re going camping this weekend.

Brother who shall not be named: *whine* It’s going to be hot and I don’t like sleeping outside, etc…

Reality: It was chilly and he slept on an air mattress in the truck.

The next reason for having these jars is to see that being thankful makes us see the good that God has for us in everything.  Giving thanks not only helps us to see the good things, but also builds trust that God wants to give us these things.  Complaining robs us of joy and the actual experience itself.  Negativity taints the perception of reality.  Not that there isn’t a time to admit that everything is not ideal or perfect, but it takes more work to notice the good sometimes—and that is work worth learning to do.

At first, I thought of just having a thankfulness jar, but that didn’t seem enough.  I wanted us to be aware of reality.  And being mostly boys (or a tomboy in my case), I knew we needed to make it a sort of competition.  So, at the end of each week, we look to see which jar outweighs which.   So far, there has been much less complaining.  Even though I contributed several black stones last night for my attitude, this week’s thankfulness jar still won out.  Yay us!

The personal why of the jars…

Earlier this year, I was (finally) diagnosed with Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (Chronic Fatigue Syndrome) and this practice of mindfulness in thankfulness really goes hand-in-hand with other things that I’m working to learn: setting firm boundaries for what I will and won’t do for others, admitting that I can’t always accomplish something physically or mentally (depending on the day or week or month), and that I need to be fine with just being and not always doing.  This is tough since most of my life, I’ve been completely reliant on myself and accomplishing goals is how I’ve defined both myself and success.  And yet, if God had not forcefully slowed me down from my sprinting through life, I would not have learned many of these important lessons.    Thankfully, because I’ve tried to be very careful with how much I extend myself this year, I am (physically) feeling like a different person than the one I was a year ago 🙂

So I suppose that these jars are a physical extension of what I’m trying to learn: to notice and be grateful for the moment instead of always looking to the next thing.