Thankfulness is the beginning of gratitude. Gratitude is the completion of thankfulness. Thankfulness may consist merely of words. Gratitude is shown in acts.

– Henri Frederic Amiel, Swiss Philosopher and Poet

I am grateful that I live in a nation that sets aside a day of thanksgiving. And . . . you know what I am about to say . . . every day is a perfect day to appreciate our blessings. Among my favorite aphorisms is one I saw posted on a message-board outside a small, rural North Carolina church: “Millions of people are praying for what you take for granted.”

Kind of stops you in your tracks, doesn’t it? It did me.

We who have so much tend to take our bounty for granted. So as our Thanksgiving Day approaches, let us explore gratitude not as something that we need a national holiday to prompt us into feeling, but as an aspect of our kanay—of our beingness—that permeates all that we think, say, and do.

The English word “gratitude” comes from roots meaning “thankfulness,” “pleasing,” and “grace.” It is usually defined as our feeling thankful for all the good things, people, and situations in our lives. But just feeling gratitude does not do justice to the meaning of this word. As the Amiel quotation at the top of this post reminds us, gratitude is thankfulness in action.

From the Andean mystical perspective, gratitude engages all three of our human powers, which are yachay, munay, and llank’ay. Yachay is knowledge gained through personal experience. It is the doorway to gratitude, for we experience something and feel good about that or even feel blessed by what happened. We are uplifted by having had that experience. The experience could be anything: from winning the lottery to meeting an amazing person to overcoming a bad habit to surviving a terrible accident or a dire health diagnosis. If our acknowledgment of our good fortune is not fleeting, as most emotions are, then it blossoms into a deeper feeling.

Feelings take us to our power of munay, which is love under our will, the conscious choice to think, speak, and act from love. It is the capacity at our sonqo, which is the energetic heart center. The sonqo is the center of our feelings, and munay in its fullest expression is the pinnacle of human feelings. However, munay can be expressed along a continuum of intensity, from tenderness at one end of the spectrum to devotion at the other. If the energy of gratitude expands from our thoughts into our feelings, then we really begin to “own” the state of gratitude as an aspect of our kanay, not only as how we know ourselves but also as a power that we are capable of expressing out in the world. We not only feel gratitude, but can act from gratitude. As American writer William Arthur Ward once said, “Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.”

What does it mean to be gratitude in action? I claim no expertise! This is work I continue doing within myself. But I can imagine that like munay, gratitude expresses itself along a spectrum, in gestures small and large, and everything in between. To act from gratitude is to make the choice to find something, no matter how small, that is “pleasing” in every person and every situation. We don’t have to wear rose-colored glasses, repress heavy feelings, or deny reality, but even taking a homeopathic dose of “pleasing” can reduce the power of a knee-jerk judgement that a person or situation is going to be difficult, disagreeable, upsetting, or challenging. Through the choice to acknowledge that there is something “pleasing” even in the ugliest of situations, we make room for the “grace” that underlies gratitude. Grace cannot be earned. It is not offered only to those whom we deem worthy or deserving of it. Grace is given from one person to another freely, without condition. Grace may be what gratitude in action actually is: If we are looking, grace may be the crack through which we glimpse even the tiniest light of something “pleasing” shining through and into our awareness. As the Leonard Cohen lyric goes: “Forget your perfect offering. There is a crack, a crack, in everything. That’s how the light gets in.”

However we choose to express our gratitude and to act from that gratitude, I think that if we keep practicing it eventually we come to a realization, as the Buddhist proverb goes, that “enough is a feast.” That proverb may have been referring to material possessions, whereas I am applying it to what we think of ourselves and others. I am suggesting that by acting from gratitude, we change not only how we engage others and life, but how we engage with ourselves. Gratitude shows us how we are always already “enough,” whatever condition we find our life in or whatever the current state of being we are experiencing. We each are a feast of enoughness! If we really believe that, then we will give thanks for whatever measure of grace we are capable of offering in our relationships, our work, our service, and more. And if we believe we are “enough” right now, just as we are, then we increase our capacity to receive grace from others. This is the ayni, or reciprocity, of gratitude as action.

When we say we are looking for a spiritual path to follow, whether it be the Andean tradition or some other tradition—I say that we don’t have to look for a spiritual path. We already have one. Our life is our spiritual path. An “attitude of gratitude,” as the saying goes, is among the spiritual superpowers—not just as an attitude in our thinking and feelings, but in our actions. The biblical concept of spiritual gifts as charismata is defined as “grace coming to visible effect in word or deed.” One of the aspects of the Andean tradition that I love most is that it is rooted deeply and firmly in the human world. We are seeking to develop ourselves not just for our own benefit but to the benefit of others and as a visible effect in the world. When others develop themselves, we benefit from their having made the choice to have their own sami-filled visible effects in the world. Again, this is ayni. Practicing gratitude as ayni prompts us to look and engage both inwardly and outwardly: we recognize our own uplifted state and we acknowledge the source person or event that fostered our upliftment. Through the continuing cycle of ayni—which is always a two-way exchange—we can then give back what we have received.

So, as we gather around the Thanksgiving table, let us realize that “enough is a feast” and find something pleasing “enough” in everyone and every event—and then let us express it through our actions. If Uncle Joe is telling the same old family story again, for the tenth year in a row, let him know that the yearly retelling has created a tradition and a person has to be pretty special to create a tradition. When the gravy runs out—as it inevitably does—instead of complaining or looking accusingly at those who overindulged to everyone else’s expense, compliment the chef on a spectacular gravy that is always, without fail, every year, the most popular food at the feast. Of course, there is no “gratitude” unless it is real and in integrity. But seeing the “enough” in everyone and every situation always, somehow, in some amazingly unexplainable and magical way, fosters just enough gratitude that by its own force it easily flows out of us and into the world. And for our choice—and ability—to do that, we give thanks.

Postscript: My gratitude to all the seekers and light-bearers who have attended my classes this year and in years past, and who follow this blog. I am enriched by you as I hope you are by me. May we continue to work together to create a sami-filled forcefield that spills out with visible effect in the world.