Get Relational: Week 4 of The Uncommon Normal #GratitudeRipples Challenge
Here we are, nearing the end of November, and perhaps for you, Thanksgiving feels like the climax. You’ve done the thing. Kept up with the gratitude challenge thus far. But now you’re elbows deep into planning and cooking and peopling, and it feels less important and far more inconvenient to keep your gratitude practice going.
Let’s also acknowledge that while Thanksgiving is a joyous time of food and family for some, for many there are still tensions. Unmet expectations. Disappointments. Loss. I see you, and I hope that you continue this gratitude journey because I’ve witnessed so many ways that gratitude heals. Often it comes before, not after, the resolution, the restoration, the reconciliation.
Anyone else become more task-oriented when you feel squeezed? You clip your words, answer distracted, hustle as if it will all fall apart if you don’t. Yeah, same.
The mounting to-do lists during the holiday season can deflate our best intentions to be relational. Present. People-focused. But gratitude teaches us a different way. Invites us to make space for the things that matter, even when the pressure amplifies.
24 hours. That’s all any of us gets. My friend Joy Marker, in one of the earliest stories on Begin Within: A Gratitude Series, reminded us that “(To Live Well This One Beautiful Life) Gratitude Must Become A Habit.” We don’t get to multiply our hours, but we do get to choose how to spend them. Even on Thanksgiving, and the days after.
The way we do Thanksgiving has a lot to say about whether we’ll walk longer with gratitude or raise a hand and part ways. I know because I’ve forgotten the point of doing a gratitude challenge on Thanksgiving Day, of all days. Same for you?
Let’s do Thanksgiving differently this year
What if we spent less time trying to make everything perfect this Thanksgiving and instead invited our people into the beautiful mess of being real? Shared our hearts, not just the meal? Let gratitude lead us to slow down, pay attention, prioritize people.
Last week we talked about how gratitude grows our curiosity. We chose to stay where it was a little uncomfortable. A little inconvenient. We leaned into our questions. Actively listened to others’ stories. Looked for the things that connect us.
Let’s carry our curiosity with us as we gather on Thanksgiving. Bring it to the table, and to the counters where we prepare the food and wash the dishes. Curiosity tears down walls that divide us. Helps us take ourselves less seriously. Not take the person across from us for granted. So follow where it leads you to ask another question, open up a little more, risk a little more relationally.
The biggest win isn’t a Pinterest-worthy table but the people around the table. The fourth Thursday in November will come and go, but the ones we gather with matter the whole rest of the year.
Your challenge: get relational
Our challenge this week is to get relational, and what better example to follow than the way Jesus did it?
He listened.
Asked lots of questions.
Embraced interruptions.
Washed feet.
Shared hope.
Glorified God.
Our Thanksgiving gatherings provide a perfect setting to practice peopling the way Jesus did.
Where can you listen better, ask more questions, prioritize people over tasks, serve generously, let the hope within you encourage others, and point all the honor to Christ who more than deserves it all? Take a few minutes to reflect and jot down what comes to mind.
Then, let’s take our relational goals before God. They’re not meant to burden us, but to invite us to the beautiful work of God cultivating us and letting what He’s nurturing inside us overflow out to people all around us.
It’s not about you getting it right. Saying the most eloquent thanks. Impressing the people beside you with your ability to listen.
It’s about Him, and it has been the whole time.
Gratitude opens space in our hearts for God to enter in and shift the things around that have been in the wrong order. But gratitude isn’t the destination, it’s just the path that leads us more deeply into relationship with God and the people near us.
Here’s to Thanksgiving being just the beginning, not the end, of us growing in gratitude.
Here’s to being real with God, real with people, and making them both a priority.
Here’s to compassion, curiosity, generosity, humility, and deep, deep faith overflowing into our relationships.
Our gratitude prompts this week are
Hospitality – 11/22
Apology—11/23
Neighbor—11/24
Join—11/25
Understand—11/26
Support—11/27
Table—11/28
Spend some time in conversation with God about each of these words. Ask Him to show you how to define them and what He is asking you to do with them. If you hear something specific, write it down even if it’s not what you share publicly as your challenge response.
Let’s pray.
May we learn and copy how Jesus prioritizes people, shows them how they matter.
May we “shape our lives to become like the Holy One who called [us]” (1 Peter 1: 15 TPT).
May gratitude make space for the deep work God longs to do within us, and may we give Him all the glory as that beautiful work overflows into every area of our lives.
And may Thanksgiving be only the beginning of our gratitude journeys.
By the way, if you don’t have the gratitude challenge graphic yet, right-click to save your preferred size to your device. Want to know more about the gratitude challenge? Check this post to learn more about how gratitude can have a ripple effect.
Just a friend over here in your corner,
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