Tracks by Linds

Soul balm has turned into a uniform Friday posting of the weekly things that soothe my spirit. But it’s more than that – it’s a quest for the good, the hunky-dory… the bomb. No matter how big or small.

Some weeks it seems like my list is easier to rack up than others. Like when you find yourself on the lower part of your emotional roller coaster or receive bad news about something that affects you, your friends or your family. I have to admit the last couple of weeks I’ve been off my A-game. What I love about soul balm though is that it’s always there waiting to be be sought, ever-so patient to be found. No matter what life throws your way, the balm will be there. All you have to do is open your heart and notice.

This practice of gratefulness truly intrigues me. As with all practices, it gets sharper and richer with time and is the heart of both yoga and of many world religions. I wish it could be the religion of all of us. Heck, I’d follow that! This post happens to fall on the beginning of a special Canadian long weekend: Thanksgiving. What more perfect time for reflection?
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1. Fall Soups
Since Thanksgiving is a tradition of practicing thankfulness for the year’s harvest, I feel like this is an appropriate way to start. The onslaught of cooler air and cozy sweaters has seen us have two butternut squash soups, a split-pea and this coconut corn soup. Slurpy splurp :)

2. Fresh Sheets
Do you wash your sheets once a week? Ever since Oprah’s episode on dust mites, I’m an avid devotee. So much so, that I chose to write about it as one of Pravassa’s weekly challenges this month. Adore freshly washed sheets!

3. Laying in the leaves (& daily hugs!)
*Corn warning* They say love is actions over words… and though he’s not a man of elaborate script, his quadruple daily hugs, made-for-me smiles and small sentences like “I just want you to know how lucky I am…” tell me all I need to know. We took a second to enjoy the colours yesterday..his sis made a wonderful photographer.

4. Nature Walks


5. Supportive Family
Blair & I’ve been on quite the special merry-go-round with his medical school world – umpteen applications, testing, booking, switching around, to switch around again, moving, waiting, holding up hope and oh don’t forget, switching again! I know anyone reading this who is in, or is partnered with an International Med Student can attest. Our family keeps us sane, listens to our vents and shows us unconditional support. We know it’s not easy on them either!

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10 Quotes About Being Grateful

Gratitude is the fairest blossom which springs from the soul. – 
Henry Ward Beecher

Acknowledging the good that you already have in your life is the foundation for all abundance. – Eckhart Tolle

We often take for granted the very things that most deserve our gratitude. – Cynthia Ozick

For each new morning with its light, For rest and shelter of the night, For health and food, for love and friends,
Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.- William Arthur Ward

It is not good for all our wishes to be filled; through sickness we recognize the value of health; through evil, the value of good; through hunger, the value of food; through exertion, the value of rest. - Greek Proverb

Let us be grateful to people who make us happy; they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.- Marcel Proust

You simply will not be the same person two months from now after consciously giving thanks each day for the abundance that exists in your life. And you will have set in motion an ancient spiritual law: the more you have and are grateful for, the more will be given you.”- Sarah Ban Breathnach

Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn’t learn a lot today, at least we learned a little, and if we didn’t learn a little, at least we didn’t get sick, and if we got sick, at least we didn’t die; so, let us all be thankful. - Buddha

In our daily lives, we must see that it is not happiness that makes us grateful, but the gratefulness that makes us happy. – Albert Clarke

Abundance is not something we acquire. It’s something we tune into. - Wayne Dyer

Tags: Canada, Grateful, Gratefulness, Life, Quotes, Simple Pleasures, Soul Balm, Thankful, Thanksgiving