Being thankful and a little about me

I have been seeing a lot of "thankful" posts on FB lately and well...I'm just not feeling it this week. I had planned on doing the whole "30 days of Thankfulness" like so many others starting the first of November.

Well, November 1st came and went. Within two days, my children (as sweet as they are) took every ounce of my energy.  It's like everything happens at once with those kids sometimes. I love them so incredibly much but they take a ton of love, attention, discipline, and work at times. And as you may have read a few days ago the Mr. isn't around a whole lot these days.

So, here I sit reading everyone's posts and thinking to myself, "Wish I had THAT to be thankful for". Why do we do this to ourselves?? Pure punishment I tell ya. I pull out my mental comparison chart and start tallying how much I have to NOT be thankful for. And then I get bitter. And then I get sarcastic. And then my baby has a blow-out on the couch at the most inconvenient time and I start accepting the situation as "Well of course THIS would happen", and the cycle just continues.

When things start to get hard in my life I have an instant urge to respond with sarcasm and an attitude of bitter selfishness. A non-emotional attitude that pretends to let everything "roll of my back" but really just gets under my skin.  An attitude that reduces my world to just me and the small life I lead and all the problems that seem to take over it. I have seen the Lord work in this area of my life and how he can change my attitude when life "strikes" so to speak. But now and then I get caught up in how my flesh wants to react and this is definitely one of those times.

Our small group memorized this verse last week and it's been drifting in and out of my head all week...

"For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich". ~2 Corinthians 8:9

Now THAT is something to be thankful for Shannon. Right there.

I also just finished reading this 31 day series on "Determined Joy" for the past few weeks. Will you join me? Joy doesn't just happen...it takes work. And I need to be determined in finding it.