"Great-Fullness in Lean Times"

"We must realize that it is not happiness that makes us grateful, but gratitude that makes us happy."    -- Brother David Steindl-Rast   from Gratefulness, The Heart of Prayer    The gentle nature of gratitude conceals its power.  An attitude of gratitude can restore our faith, reconcile our relationships, and preserve our precious earth.  I want to live in the gentle power of gratefulness. I want to awaken each morning with its sweet fragrance wafting through my mind and heart. What I know is that my happiest moments are usually the simple moments, when my eyes behold the hidden in plain sight; when I delight in seeing the great within the small, the perfection of the ordinary, and the sufficiency of what is before me.     Simple living allows gratitude to arise more easily.  The more I let go of the things I don't need, the more space there is for what is essential to expand...for Spirit to fill me. It seems more important than ever in these times of squaring our spiritual values with sparse economic means, to choose that which truly fulfills us over that which impoverishes us.  We have all had the experience of lusting after more out of a sense of not enough. The harvest of these desires does not feed us. Only disappointment follows, because getting the "stuff" only temporarily numbs a deeper need. The antidote to "not enough" is gratefulness. It turns the economics of greed upside down, by showing us that less can be more.  As Brother David so keenly observed, "The smaller we make the container of our need; the sooner comes the overflow that becomes our delight." Paradoxically, these can be the best of times for humanity's evolution, even as we face the worst of economic realities.  When the drive for more is thwarted by economic headwinds, the old ways of acquiring fulfillment can reveal their long hidden futility.  While for some people these are desperate times, for many others it's a time of shrinking the containers of our legitimate needs.  Can this be a "bad" thing if it dials down unconscious consumption and reveals what is truly needed?  Could this not be the best of times, if we are turned inward to measure our internal storehouse and count our blessings?