I was six months pregnant when I returned from my first babymoon and I would consider it to be quite unexpected.
What was more unexpected than the trip that my husband and I decided to take at the last minute to his home village in Kenya, was what I learned from it. We booked the tickets expecting a fun-filled, exciting adventure. The fun and excitement though, was not what I took away from that trip. I took home a whole new perspective.
Gratitude and thankfulness will shift every thought and emotion you may have at this very moment. These unprecedented times in the world right now have tried to rock each one of us. COVID-19 is poking at our stability, routine, confidence, comfort, and truth. Without realizing it we may lose sight of the gifts right around us.
After walking along a long rocky road and past a wild mother giraffe and her baby, my husband and I were welcomed into the home of a Massai family we met on our way. The children ran to greet me, put homemade jewelry on my wrists and neck, and held my hand as they led us inside their manyata where they were roasting corn in the smoke-filled hut. I listened to the stories they shared as we sat around the fire. As my husband translated, I witnessed what love there was within that tiny room that their entire family slept, lived and cooked in. They did not speak of problems, trials, or sadness. They spoke of joy and gratitude for their roof, their corn, their neighbors, the rain, and for us for visiting them. They put their hands on my belly and expressed what a blessing it was to have such a gift from God inside me. Perspective was surely one of the only words that could come to mind.
When we are now in the confines of our own homes, I cannot help but remember to be thankful. If we slow down enough to reflect on the day, we may find that any stress, anxiety, fear, trial, conflict, or instability, could possibly be resolved with the right perspective. With the mindset of gratitude, we cannot help but rest in the fact that there is always hope and love to find. Negative thoughts almost always stem from thoughts rooted in self. If we could set our self aside though, we will find ourselves filled with more joy than we did before.
If you had to cancel or miss out on plans for a babymoon, flights for a vacation, tickets to a show, days at your job, or moments at a party, I guarantee if we can find it in ourselves to change our perspective, and turn toward an attitude of gratitude, we will find more joy than ever expected.
Military life has brought my days as a spouse rocking like ship at rough seas. The more I tried to fight it, the harder the seas seemed to rock. If I just board up the windows though, and ride out the storm below the deck in gratitude, trust, faith, and hope, the storms always pass, and I am left stronger and more joyful than ever before.
I think the giraffes may have it right when they look at not too much more than the land and the sky before them, their young ones beside them, and the days that they made it through left behind them.