​Collecting Scraps of Light 

the practice of gratitude as
​a thank you note to life
​

For most of us, collecting scraps of light is one of the most important
spiritual practices we can undertake.  It is our thank you note to life. 
It is the positive side of what Buddhists call "dependent origination."

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​Collecting Light

by Deborah Cooper
​
I see the way the chickadees
take turns at the feeder.
I watch a neighbor take
her husband’s hand.

I see the way the sun will find
the only interruption
in dark clouds
to toss this amber light
across the pines.
I see a row of cars
stop on the road
until the orange cat
has safely crossed,
then take off slowly, should
she change her mind.
I watch the way my brother
lifts our mother from
the wheelchair
to the car,
the shawl he lays
across her lap.
I save up every scrap
of light,
because I know that it will take
each tiny consolation
every day
to mend the world.

Collecting Light as a Gratitude Practice

The page began as a response to the sad old man about whom Dermot Kennedy so beautifully sings in "Moments Passed."  Scroll down for the song.  The original title of the page was "Sad Old Men Who Can't Let go of the Past." 

A Sad Old Man Who Can't Let Go

The beauty of Kennedy's voice is worth listening to for its own sake.  But the story is important, too.  It is the story of an old man who pines away for a lost love of his youth - a love that he never gets over.  The memory of this love is not exactly a scrap of light: it is a scrap of bondage.  He cannot live in the present and has no hope for the future.  If his life were turned into a theology, it would be called "The Theology of Pining."

Independence

I understood the man and also felt sorry for him.  I also felt that he was self-absorbed: trapped inside his mind.  I began to wonder what, if anything, might help free a person from a painful and enslaving self-absorption in which he was trapped.  It occurred to me then, and occurs to me now, that a healing antidote just might be gratitude, understood as a state of mind and way of living. 

​I best admit that the grateful way of living does not come easily for me.  I'd rather practice courage, or delight in beauty, or compassion, than gratitude.  It makes me feel too....dependent.  There's a voice in my head which says: "Thou Shalt Not be Dependent."  Truth be told, I'm pretty sure its the voice of the devil: that is, the enemy of my better self.  Still it is a powerful voice.  I suspect that others hear it, too.  We acquire it, in part, from a culture that over-emphasizes individualism and "merit" over gratitude.  If we achieve something, to our culture says, we've done it on our own.

Dependent Origination Positive and Negative

And yet the Buddhist side of my life tells me that "dependent origination" (pratitya-samutpada) is at the very heart of reality.  Everything originates in dependence on other things.  Perhaps gratitude is a positive emotional response to dependent origination.  And perhaps the opposite of gratitude, resentment, is a negative form of dependent origination.

Letting the past be past

There's another Buddhist theme that comes to mind as I think about the man who lives in the past: namely the theme of impermanence, of perpetual perishing.  A willingness to let go of the past, to let the past be past, is itself a form of respect, even gratitude, for the past.  It gives the past space to be itself.

And perhaps the practice of gratitude begins, for many, with collecting scraps of light, including light from the past, without holding on to it so tightly that it cannot become....past.

Jay McDaniel, 5/8/2018

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A Sad Old Man Who Can't Let Go of the Past

​Tell us about the concept of the new video. What inspired it, and how did it come to life?

"It's the story of a lonely older man who has been laid low by loss. And the video is based around him, but it's also based on his memories, which focus on happier times, when he was passionate, full of life and in love. And now in his old age he is none of those things, due to the loss he has suffered. The memories are his only consolation, and he relives them constantly in his head, pining for those times when he was young. These themes of loss and intense love are also key to the song, and to lots of my music." 

 JAKE VISWANATH, interviewing Dermott Kennedy

Lyrics

Maybe it's all down to the thought of her
Maybe it's all down to the loss we learned
Knew for a long time, for all it's worth.
I wanted to run to you.
What if I'm caught up on it's me you're calling?
What if I'm lost now, plus if demons come in?
When she kissed me I felt a new freedom or something
I found a moment to be brave so I let her know.
And she said, "how could I love you back, you who dropped
your dreams in the gutter?"
In my winters, she'll be burning slow,
Feels like December knows me well.
'Cause I loved you.
Does that mean nothing to you now?
I loved you.
Get me back on homely ground.
She said, "Oh I know that love is all about the wind..How it can hold me up and kill me in the end. Still I loved it"
Does that mean nothing to you now?
Days when we all watched 'till we lost the birds.
Threw a rose in, 'till it caught the turn.
Knew it felt right, we were bound to burn.
I wanted to run to you.
Maybe I've lost count of the rooms you're tall in.
Maybe I've lost count of the nighttime all ins.
So the trees and her were first to know,
It'll all be good just hold me well.
'Cause I loved you. Does that mean nothing to you now? I loved you. Get me back on homely ground. She said, "Oh I know that love is all about the wind..How it can hold me up and kill me in the end. Still I loved it" Does that mean nothing to you now?
Wasn't easy to go, I know
You shouldn't have no seat in the front row
Wasn't easy to go, I know
And the sun came out, day late though
Wasn't easy to go, I know
He pulled up, flat tyres, ten spokes
Wasn't easy to go, I know
He came all that way just to say hello
'Cause I loved you. Does that mean nothing to you now? I loved you. Get me back on homely ground. She said, "Oh I know that love is all about the wind..How it can hold me up and kill me in the end. Still I loved it" Does that mean nothing to you now?

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Three Ways to Practice Gratitude
recommended by Spirituality and Practice

• "Create a Gratitude Calendar for use in your household daily or sabbath devotional observances. Set up a schedule of blessing emphases in a date book, perhaps having a different focus for each month: (1) People We've Known, (2) People We Do Not Know but Admire (living and dead), (3) Artists, (4) Service Providers, (5) Spiritual and Other Communities, (6) Our Bodies, (7) Places, (8) Animals, (9) Nature, (10) Food and Drink, (11) Things, (12) Opportunities.
• Be a blessing by performing a service to a neighbor or a shut-in — doing a chore, running an errand, or delivering groceries.
• Extend your gratitude into your community. In appreciation for the good service of a grocery store, a cleaners, or a gas station, tell your friends about the place so that their business can grow. To thank public servants and community activists, attend meetings and fundraisers or volunteer to help in their offices."

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The Practice of Gratitude

Click on the link for quotes, practices, videos, and much more:

Gratitude as a State of Mind and Way of Life

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Gratitude and Process Theology

​Gratitude is a most Whiteheadian of virtues.  It frees the mind of the cramping confines of the ego, including its obsessions with the past, and opens up the heart to a recognition of the many ways in which, as individuals, we are composed of our relationships with others, apart from which we could not exist at all.  It reveals "the many" that "become one" in our lives, moment by moment, bringing us into existence.  A natural response is "thanks." 

Thanks to what?  ​We can thank the deep Listening in whose heart we and everything else unfolds, but we can also thank people, places, animals, buildings, our own bodies, and memories.  It all depends on the context. 

And sometimes gratitude is not what we need, especially those who lack a sense of self, or who suffer from too much humility.  Gratitude has its limits, even when directed toward God.   

​But strangely, surprisingly, the more grateful we are, the more ourselves we become.  Gratitude does not weaken the self, it strengthens the self.  It empowers, opening up possibilities for creative transformation and enables us once again to laugh and to dance, not alone, but with the things we are grateful for.  (Jay McDaniel)

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The Science of Thank You Notes

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Growing Old and Growing Up

​You see it in small towns all over America.  High school football reigns supreme, and someone who was a high school football star forever defines himself in terms of that period of his life.  He hangs around town, sharing stories of the great game, but never really grows up.  He grows old, yes, but he does not grow up.

You also see it in those who had intense love affairs in their young adulthood.  Like the man in Dermott Kennedy's "Moments Passsed."  Kennedy sings the song marvelously, and the video adds to the experience.  The song is about a sad old man whose memories of a lost love are his only consolation, and who relives the memories constantly, pining for those times when he was young.

Of course this happens to women, too, and to all whose lives transcend the binaries of "male" and "female."  Call it destructive nostalgia.  It is enslaved to memories of a lost ideal.  There's a lot of this enslavement in strident patriotism, too, in longing for "the good old days."

Metaphysics
​
Life is process, say the process theologians.  And by this they mean, not only that life is a creative advance into novelty, but also that life is perpetually perishing.   You'll find a short video on this in Open Horizons: see Perpetual Perishing: Morii.  The bottom line is that even healthy relationships fade away in time.  Buddhists are right.  An important part of healthy living is to be open to new possibilities and to let go of the past -- or at least of clinging to it -- when it has lost its subjective immediacy.

Let Thinking become Thanking

What to do?  For some, one option is to let thinking become thanking.

John S. Donne writes: "I can see letting go of the past by thanking God for it, giving it over or giving it back to God, and thus finding eternal life in the presence rather than simply in the present. Thinking back into the past thus becomes thanking and letting go of the past."

If belief in God is not a possibility, then simply thank the universe, or thank life, or thank coincidence, or thank the mystery of existence.  The key is to thank something beyond yourself for the gift of what was, and then to let go.

But thanking, too, is a process.  We cannot simply thank once and then its done.  Thanking best becomes a habit of the heart, and the cultivation of this habit takes intention.  Call it the habit of gratitude.

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There is an organization in Berkeley, California, that claims to offer science-based insights for a meaningful life.  It is called the Greater Good Science Society at UC Berkeley.

​I can't vouch for the science, but I can vouch for some of the ten practices they recommend for developing the habit of gratitude.  I will list them in brief.  Please click here for explanations.

1. Keep a Gratitude Journal

2. Remember the Bad

3. Ask yourself three questions

4. Learn prayers of gratitude

5. Come to your senses

6. Use Visual Reminders

7. Make a Vow to Practice Gratitude

8. Watch your language

9. Go through the motions

10.  Think outside the box

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