Saying Thank You

Tuesdays in the Chapel
February 15, 2011

Be Thankful
Be thankful that you don't already have everything you desire,
If you did, what would there be to look forward to?
Be thankful when you don't know something
For it gives you the opportunity to learn.
Be thankful for the difficult times.
During those times you grow.
Be thankful for your limitations
Because they give you opportunities for improvement.
Be thankful for each new challenge
Because it will build your strength and character.
Be thankful for your mistakes
They will teach you valuable lessons.
Be thankful when you're tired and weary
Because it means you've made a difference.
It is easy to be thankful for the good things.
A life of rich fulfillment comes to those who are
also thankful for the setbacks.
GRATITUDE can turn a negative into a positive.
Find a way to be thankful for your troubles
and they can become your blessings.
~ Author Unknown ~

The Power of Saying Thank You
So as I contemplated what I might say today I reflected on Bobs charge of talking about the things in our lives that make us Whole, like the , family, work, friends
So like any modern person I turned to Google for inspiration.
My search for being whole led me to links on, “Prepare and Believe – Gods words makes us Whole - to Whole foods makes us lazy cooks.
So having my inspiration somewhat jump started by the internet I turned to the next best thing my own thoughts
Recent incidents made me begin to think about gratitude and in fact the act of saying “Thank You” as important elements in making our life whole.
With this inspiration…. I tried Google again and found that saying thank you is indeed powerful. The links I found this time ranged from “fulfilling yourself and those you praise”, to becoming a more powerful sales person”.
Needless to say my comments today will be around how saying thank you helps us become whole
For this moment I want to make the distinction between being grateful and saying thank you. Again for this moment , the act or art of being grateful has profound effect on how you live your life day to day.
Gratefulness ranges from being thankful for what you have and what you don’t have both views can lead you to contentment. Being thankful for peace as well as adversity can lead to contentment, and wholeness.
But saying thank you is both self fulfillment as well as an empowerment of others which in turn helps to make you whole
I have been struck lately by the simple acts of kindness that I have seen in traffic letting another driver navigate a snow drift and then letting them move “ahead” in Boston no less, and the return of a “thank you waive” is, Amazing.
Since I have been thinking about this topic of thank you I have taken the time to listen to my own “thank yous” and to those who thank me rather than just letting it disappear in the normal discourse of the day.
I often would tell my teams, and my children that if someone gives you a complement you must say “thank you” (humbly) because it takes great strength, energy and commitment to give a compliment and as you take that energy in you want to give it back balance.
They become whole you become whole.
So my message today is that wholeness which is a journey and not a destination can begin with grateful contemplation and saying “thank you”
I suggest that we all take a moment today to think about who we may not have thanked most recently and maybe begin with our family members and work out from there.
because it is those who are closest to us that we all too often take for granted but if we believe in the power of thank you we must begin with those that mean the most to us.
Then look outside your family circle and find that person who says hello every day that performs every day , day in day out that we hazard to take for granted let them know how they make a difference in your life.
We all have a person in our life like that, find them tell them thank you.
And remember…The power that is given……….. is also received…………..
=========================================================
So it is impossible for me to end this morning without sharing a sporting quote or two of inspiration
My first is from John Wooden who said about gratitude–
Things turn out best for people…………. who make the best
of the way things turn out.

And finally an anonymous quote that I like very much –
People don’t care how much you know……………..until they know how much you care……….
Show someone how much you care today………….tell them ………Thank You

Thank you for joining me today.
John Benedick
Assistant Director of Athletics

READING 2:
When we face the fact that every life worth living has its discouragements, its own “unfairness” if you like, we have then taken a giant step towards happiness.
We are no longer crushed or consumed by the injustices and discouragements of life. We expect them. We learn not to let those discouragements distract us from focusing on the great goals we have set for our lives. When I asked a varsity football player this fall if he was discouraged by a nagging injury, he said to me, “Yes, sometimes it gets to me. Then I think, well, this is football, you have to expect that you’ll be hurting a lot of the season, and then I think about getting up for next Saturday’s game and it really doesn’t bother me that much.” In any life worth living, we will be hurting much of the time. But as we mature, we acquire the faith, the perspective, that the discouragements, the injuries, cannot break us, cannot make us lose sight of the great things we are determined to achieve. With our minds on the goal of winning Saturday’s game, we are able to endure the injury. That faith grows stronger and stronger every time we overcome discouragement and pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and go on. That’s why Sanderson could write at the end of his time as headmaster of Oundle School: “Faith is the belief in the ultimate triumph of right-doing, [faith is] not a formal assent, but a living belief acquired by endurance, by ‘hardness’ of life. It is belief which is forced slowly upon the individual; it is the result of experience, of actions tested in the past. It becomes the basis of his future.”

~ F. Washington (Tony) Jarvis, former Headmaster, Roxbury Latin Academy, from With Love and Prayer: A Headmaster Speaks to the Next Generation ~