Digging Up Gratitude

[This post originally appeared on Chelsey's personal blog.]

Two framed posters hanging above the couch in my living room have the words “inhale” and “exhale” scribbled across them. I bought and framed these Etsy prints when I first moved into my apartment a year and some change ago. It was the beginning of a grueling nine months. Working in ministry; working in catering; learning how to be a 24 year old; adjusting less than gracefully to a new family normal after my parents moved across the country; lather, rinse, repeat. Running from my office to my kitchen to make lunch to fold laundry these words seemed to scream out in reminder—don’t forget to breathe! Filled with anxiety and angst and hurt, stuffing myself beneath blankets and cats on the couch, they coached me gently—inhale, exhale. In those nine months it was difficult to find moments of solitude, but now I have seemed to inherit an abundance of them. My life has shifted from a season of needing to find little corners of inhaling and exhaling throughout the week to a season almost exclusively marked by quiet and rest.

Inhale, exhale seems to be the thesis of this fall and to be completely honest, it has been a hard adjustment. I really like busy, really like my days to be bursting at the seams with noise, and it is incredibly uncomfortable to learn to sit in stillness. My workload remains heavy, but the majority of my workweek is spent with a newborn in an empty house, a blaring invitation to press the pause button and take a deep breath for 35 hours a week.

At the beginning of the fall, when I was still in the adjusting-to-a-new-job-turned-teenage-angst phase, I would make lists of things I was grateful for to try and counteract my unease. I am a deep feeler if there ever was one, and it is hard for me to recognize something as truth if I don’t feel it is true. This makes gratitude lists in the midst of change and transition and fear of failing incredibly challenging, because I don’t feel like being grateful, thank you very much. But day after day I would sit at a dining room table in East Nashville and write down a few things I was grateful for—alongside a few strongly worded prayers—and my heart began to soften. All the sharp edges within me were being sandpapered down and I began to do what this season is intended for—I began to breathe deeply.

I have always been skeptical of trying to conjure up gratitude in the midst of hardship because it can be misused as avoidance. An example I see often is, in an effort to try and avoid sadness or fear, I am going to list what I am grateful for so I don’t have to feel my real emotions. This is, quite frankly, bullshit and I am not about circumventing honest feelings in an effort to look more put together and holy.

What I am learning, though, is that gratitude and sadness or gratitude and fear are not mutually exclusive. In fact, gratitude is not a feeling at all. It is a heart position, and when it is real and not being used as a distraction it is often hard won. Because it is not a feeling, it is not dependent on our ever-changing emotions and it doesn’t exempt us from our pain. Learning to be grateful is the discipline of observation—stopping to look around and acknowledge the many ways in which God is a God who is with us even in the face of trial.

More and more I am convinced that gratitude is not a natural reaction to our circumstances but a choice to change our language, perspective and attitude towards our circumstances. Like anything else worth having in this life, it is something we have to cultivate and grow through discipline. Planting small seeds in often dry ground. Spending mornings in intentional quiet. Learning to sit in the awkward stillness and jot down half-hearted thanks until they materialize into wholehearted gratitude. Water the soil again and again. Be okay with getting our knees dirty. Wait on that little stem to sprout out of the earth with mud-caked hands and whispered prayers. Thank you for the dirt, thank you for the hard, character building work of gratitude, thank you for entrusting something small and seemingly insignificant to me.

It is a muscle we must learn to build—showing up to the gym day after day until we are strong and have acquired a natural routine. It is more than just seasonally appropriate or culturally trendy, it is foundational to our physical, emotional and spiritual well-being. Our heart position, whether it is one of fear, unrest, or gratitude, is the lens we see our daily lives through and it will shape our character for the better or worse. I am seeing how essential it is that we choose the latter. As Anne Frank, an expert in the field of gratitude, once said, “think of all the beauty left around you and be happy.”

Because it is Thanksgiving week and you may love practical discipline steps, here are a couple ways I have learned to practice gratitude this fall:

1. Making lists/journaling, obviously. Writing down things that I notice are gifts but I may not feel grateful for at the moment—teaching my heart to recognize and respond to the work of God in my life.

2. Going on walks. I like walking in state park areas and I am so obsessed with the outdoors that this is an easy way for me to practice gratitude. My heart automatically responds to some fresh air. I have also started not bringing anything to listen to if I am going by myself. This helps me stay completely present to what’s happening around me instead of getting lost in music/a podcast.

3. Fasting from social media. Even if it is just a couple hours a day a couple times a week, you need this in your life. Constantly looking at other people’s lives stirs up envy, which stirs up discontentment, which pulls the gratefulness rug out from underneath us. Take some time just being present to your life and not needing to scroll through everyone else’s.

4. Connecting. Be intentional about connecting to yourself and connecting to others. We can get so busy we forget to hear the loneliness in our lives and consequently forget to amend it with connection. Get a cup of coffee with a good friend, invite a group to margaritas and tacos, throw around a baseball with your nephew (my favorite pastime). Bubble up with thankfulness for the best gift in your life—the people you love and are loved by.

5. Make some tea, light a candle and read a book (or something else you really love). Right now I’m working on Braving the Wilderness by Brené Brown, who is a freaking genius. Last night I sat in my living room with a candle that smells like a Pacific Northwest forest and read wisdom about the human condition. It was a glorious Sunday evening. Highly recommended.

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The End of An Era: Saying Goodbye to Windrose

Hi friends,

Announcement (sounds so formal, doesn’t it?):

It's the end of an era.

I’ve decided that, after nearly 8 years of telling stories of navigating life, this season of Windrose is drawing to a close.

Even Here: Words for When You're Wandering

When I was 22 years old, I visited the desert for the first time.

A metaphorical desert, if we’re getting technical.

I was fresh out of college, starry-eyed and eager to begin my post-grad life. I had big ‘ole me-centered dreams: a shiny, brag-worthy PR job in the music industry! An apartment with an exposed brick wall that (somehow) would fit an upright piano! A committed relationship with a kind, goofy man!

I got exactly none of those things.

To summarize an entire year’s worth of emotion: I was devastated.

What is Home?

Late last night, I flew back into town after a week away, the city lights covering the Valley like a blanket of incandescent flowers. I’ve flown into Phoenix at least a dozen times at this point. Usually, I can identify a handful of landmarks, like my antenna-scarred South Mountain or the twinkling lights of the bridges spanning Tempe Town Lake.

Flying into Nashville, however, was always different.

I Don't Live Here Anymore

I recently returned to Nashville for the first time since moving to Phoenix five months ago.

Before my reunion, I often said that the word “home” could apply to both Nashville and Phoenix. Nashville is my home. Phoenix is my home. I could find that home-sweet-home feeling in both cities.

During my 8 days back, I frequented my old haunts. The brickwalled coffee shop still serves the meanest mocha in town. The hillside winery still proves to be a worthwhile spot to sip away a sunny Sunday afternoon. The hip burger joint still offers a lovely evening to dine with friends, new and old. The lime-green Mexican restaurant on the corner of Whitebridge still feels like a queso-soaked refuge.

There were many “stills,” but there were changes, too.

Why did you move?

A cardstock print sits propped against the lamp on my desk: a taupe watercolor swipe outlining a peakside Saguaro, the sun a tiny ring above. Beneath this minimalist illustration are these words in typeface: “I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.”

I happened upon this notecard-sized print on the way out of a shop last weekend, after already having completed another purchase. It was the last print of its kind in the pile. I had to have it. I returned to the cashier: “This one, too.”

You see, this verse has been a thread weaving through my story, simple words spoken by a prophet long dead, a passage of comfort I’ve returned to again and again since my pilgrimage to the desert four years ago, when I inked a cactus on my wrist.

The Good Old Days

Last week was National Margarita Day.

I did not, however, celebrate the holiday. Truthfully, I’ve yet to find THE Mexican place here in Phoenix. You know the one: gaudy decorations, cheap food, even cheaper margaritas.

But there’s a Mexican restaurant at the corner of Charlotte and Whitebridge in Nashville, TN.

You may have heard of it.

Witching Hour (or, Fighting Off Demons at 3 am with a Box Cutter)

Between the hours of 3 - 4 am, I find myself awakened by nothing in particular. The room is silent. There is no sound outside. No loud car horns. No dogs barking.

I’m upset.

I wish it was something other than just me. Then I could stop it. Nothing is to blame. It feels like moments have passed since I closed my eyes. The moments of a long dreamless sleep last about 4 hours.

10 Life Lessons This Cross-Country Move is Attempting to Teach Me

There are a few lessons life has attempted to teach me since my move — all things that I haven’t yet spiced up into a full essay, but deserve to be memorialized by my metaphorical pen nonetheless.

So I present a collection of lessons I’ve learned — and am still learning — in the last 3 months.

What Will Your Life Look Like?

Tomorrow marks 3 months.

Three months here, sharing a zip code with Saguaros.

“So how is Phoenix?” a friend asked me over the phone as I sat on my balcony beneath glowing string lights, a pour of raspberry wine in my hand. The sun was setting, painting the eastern mountains with rosy swipes of redemption.

How has Phoenix been these last three months?

What is it Trying to Tell You, if Only You’d Listen?

I went on a date recently. Two glasses of Riesling, pleasant conversation, and a perfectly amicable guy — it was an altogether fine evening.

However, I wasn’t interested in a second date.

Not because of any run-for-the-hills red flags. Not because I didn’t think he was cute. Not because we didn’t get along. I simply — wasn’t interested.

There’s no better way to explain it. No fear-based avoidance of the potential for a healthy relationship. No disdain for commitment that needs a heavy round of therapy to work through. Nothing deeper than the inner sense that a second date just wasn’t necessary.

But, I said yes to getting dinner again with him.

The Other Side of Yes

I’m a No Girl.

In many ways, this is a good thing. I’m able to confidently decline invitations that disinterest me.

“Want to go whitewater rafting?” No thank you, I’m comfy right here on the bank.

“Want to do a shot?” No thank you, I’ll take my liquor with lime juice and Triple Sec, plz.

“Want to try this carrot cake?” No thank you, Harry, I can’t eat gluten.

“Want to go to Broadway?” No thank you, I’d prefer to go to bed.

In many ways, however, being a No Girl originates less from personal boundaries and more from fear. Fear and I happen to be pretty tight; we talk on the daily. Fear has been the primary consultant for many of my life decisions, in fact.

A Song for Growth

A year ago, a friend of mine got a job at a well known tech company. He had been slogging through the interviews, and he finally got an offer. Obviously he deserved it. He was a hard worker, and his attitude for success and life was admirable to say the least. I knew he was beyond qualified.

But at the time, I was on a career path I couldn’t see myself being happy in. I had made the mistake of staying in the industry mainly for the money. Every month in the industry was a reminder of how much I did not want to stay. It created a nasty cycle of overthinking and career angst. Feelings of inadequacy and existentialism rooted themselves deep inside me. I couldn’t focus on anything and was utterly disconnected from the work I was doing.

I admit I wasn’t happy for him.

Health, LifeChelsey SatterleeNovember 23, 2017FeaturedComment

Digging Up Gratitude

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