“Practicing gratitude doesn’t mean burying unwanted feelings

or looking for the silver lining in a bad situation. Practicing gratitude means acknowledging what is still good alongside the mess."

― Heidi Barr

Sometimes good things do not come in the packaging that we expect.

I have come to notice that in my own life when things I have prayed or worked for come to pass, but are presented in a form or in a manner that I did not expect, I often run the risk of missing the blessing.

I think this is because we build up in our minds how our dreams will come to pass, how our requests will be granted, and how our problems will be resolved. We develop an expectation of how things will look in the end—the proverbial ‘happily ever after.’ We get so singularly focused on what we expect to see, that we often miss the moment that is right in front of us. We miss opportunities for celebration and thanksgiving.

I have a track record of being a first-rate offender in this regard. Over the years, I’ve had many situations where I have wanted specific changes to occur and/or certain opportunities to come to pass. I’ve prayed for everything from job promotions, to the healing of a loved one, to financial stability, to the reconciliation of relationships. The list goes on and on. I have waited expectantly for the answers and when the answers did not come in the packaging I expected, I was not happy. In fact, in times when the answers ultimately did come in the form or manner that I originally expected, but I had to go through an uncomfortable or challenging process beforehand, I wasn’t exactly oozing with gratitude after experiencing the additional adversity.

I am sure I am not alone.

Have you felt (or would you feel) disheartened when your prayer for promotion at work comes not in the form of a new job title and increased salary, but instead in the form of an assignment to lead a project consisting of a team of your peers with difficult personalities and subpar work ethic?

Have you felt (or would you feel) disappointed when your desire for a reliable mode of transportation to and from work comes not in the form of a new car, but instead in the form of a free metro pass?

Have you ever wanted to reconcile with a friend who despite your best efforts never reciprocated your efforts to rekindle the friendship?

Some iteration of these types of scenarios have likely happened to all of us at some point.

After years of missing the blessings in such situations, I have come to learn that I must keep my eyes wide open and learn how to discern and appreciate the good amidst the bad. Often, alongside the mess, is a whole lot of good. Of course, there are situations where it is difficult to find the blessing, but even in the most difficult challenges of our lives, the blessings will, at some point, become apparent, and we will be able to discern how we grew through each experience.

The next time the answer to what you’ve been waiting for doesn’t come in the packaging you visualized or would have preferred, I challenge you to first take a moment to express gratitude for the answer, and second, think about how the answer actually does benefit you, bless you and/or position you better moving forward. If you do these two things, I believe that you will experience more contentment and peace in your navigation of the life you’ve been gifted.

I certainly have.

Josephine Leavell Allensworth: World Changer of the Month — July 2023

Born in 1855 in Trenton, Kentucky, Josephine Leavell was an accomplished pianist, organist and music teacher. She attended Roger Williams University in Nashville, Tennessee where she met prominent Baptist minister, Lieutenant Colonel Allen Allensworth, the first African American to reach the rank of lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army. The couple married in 1877. They had two daughters, Eva and Nella.

Upon Rev. Allenwsorth’s retirement from the military in 1906, the family settled in Los Angeles, California. During that time, they became inspired by the idea of establishing a self-sufficient, all-Black California community where African Americans could live free of the racial discrimination that pervaded post-Reconstruction America. Their dream was to build a community where Black people might live and create “sentiment favorable to intellectual and industrial liberty.”

On June 30, 1908, the Allensworths and their business partner Professor William Alexander Payne established the California Colony and Home Promoting Association. The Association purchased 20 acres of land from the Pacific Farming Company with the goal of establishing a town for Black soldiers. The land, situated in Tulare County, about 40 miles north of Bakersfield, in the heart of the San Joaquin Valley, was divided into individual parcels, forming “a colony of orderly and industrious African Americans who could control their own destiny.”

Allensworth's reputation drew people from all over the country, causing some to buy property sight-unseen in order to support the efforts. California's first African American school district was established there in 1910. Soontherafter, residents elected the first African-American Justice of the Peace in post-Mexican California. By 1914, the Allensworth community had grown to 900 acres of deeded land.

An activist and leader in her own right, Josephine founded the town’s Women’s Improvement League, sat on the school board, and donated the property for the Mary Dickinson Memorial Library, the town’s public library which was named for her mother.

Allensworth’s prosperity peaked in 1925, after which time the lack of water available for irrigation began to plague the town. The water needed for irrigation was never supplied in the amount promised by the Pacific Farming Company, the land development firm that handled the original purchase. As a result, town leaders became engrossed in lengthy and expensive legal battles with the company, expending scarce financial resources on a battle they would not win.

By 1930 the town’s population had dropped below 300 people, as residents and nearby farmers began to leave in search of other employment. The deficient water supply would no longer sustain the town’s agricultural and ranching enterprises. By 1966, the town was scheduled for demolition when arsenic was found in the water supply. The state of California eventually stepped in and preserved the land and the buildings, designating the area as the “Colonel Allensworth State Historic Park.”

To this day, Allensworth remains the only California community to be founded, financed and governed by African Americans. One historian described Allensworth as “a planned experiment in civic power that had significant impact around the state and meaning for all…Just as the town touched diverse peoples and places around California, today Colonel Allensworth State Historic Park attracts a wide array of visitors of all ethnic groups—drawn to this symbol of the universal dream of freedom.”

This text is excerpted from:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephine_Leavell_Allensworth, https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/allensworth-josephine-leavell-1855-1938/, https://www.quinlanmuseum.com/resources/AllensworthExhibitionbooklet.pdf and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_Allensworth.

"Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase."

― Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Faith. For those of us who consider ourselves educated and of the intellectual variety, the idea of having faith, particularly in a higher, supernatural being, may seem counterintuitive. The idea that human beings should place their hope in a being that they cannot perceive, touch or access using the five senses may seem illogical and ludicrous for some. Yet here I am, a person who considers herself not unintelligent, choosing to believe and hold on to my faith.

My faith has shepherded me through some of the most trying experiences of my life, and it continues to do so. And to be clear, I didn’t just limp across the finish line, gutted and half-dead at the culmination of these trials; I have been able to thrive, grow and soar as I navigated, and continue to navigate, life’s various hurdles. And I have observed the same in others who have chosen to access their faith.

When difficulties present themselves in our lives, it is human nature to question why we are being faced with a particular problem. A litany of questions may run through our heads. Why me? What have I done to deserve this? Will there ever be a way out of this? Why can’t this experience just be over already? What if this experience breaks me?

We humans like our comfort. We like our status quo. We enjoy pleasure. So when we are faced with an experience that is uncomfortable, novel or painful, we want out. We want to avoid it at all costs and often our first response is to search for a way around it.

I can acknowledge that up until the past several years, I spent the majority of my life expectantly waiting for the dissipation of certain challenges and issues. I had conditioned myself to believe that once I achieved a certain status or hit certain benchmarks, the overwhelming majority of challenges would cease to exist. That oppression, discrimination, isolation and disparate treatment would become things of the past. That, somehow, through my ascension, I would be able to avoid conflict, maintain emotional equilibrium at all times, and move through life nonplussed. As I’m sure you have surmised, as I've been entrusted with more responsibility and opportunities, various challenges have not gone away. In fact, in many ways they have proportionately grown. However, the ongoing presence of these challenges notwithstanding, I am so grateful that I can remain in a place of peace and gratitude; and that is wholly due to my faith.

Even though I do not know how each trial will resolve, I choose to believe that I will not only survive life’s challenges, but that I will thrive through them. I choose to believe I will come through each difficulty better, stronger and more equipped to face future obstacles. I choose to believe that the hurdles are more substantial because my ability to navigate them is better developed.

I choose to have faith. And no matter your position on the issue of faith, if you are struggling with life’s challenges and difficulties, and you feel that you can barely keep your head above water, I encourage you to try faith. Even the scientific community has had to acknowledge the positive impact faith has not only on mental health, but on prognosis and recovery after serious illness, trauma and surgery. Moreover, a correlation even exists between faith and healing from terminal illness. Now, faith is the substance of things hoped for; the evidence of things not seen.

If you desperately need tomorrow to be a brighter day, I encourage you to try faith.