Be Grateful

Do you feel grateful for your life and for what you are? I didn’t use to be grateful. Sometimes I envy people because they are richer, smarter, more good looking, have more friends, or every aspects of their life just seem better than mine. Why? Because I am a human. Human will never feel satisfy of what they got and always feel lacking of something despite of what they had. Until one day, somebody gave me a short clip about Nick Vujicic and it was very inspiring and it taught me how to be grateful. I’ll tell you how this little man can teach you about being grateful!

                Nick was born on 4 December 1982 in Melbourne, Australia without limbs because of a rare disease called “Tetra-amalia syndrome”. Nick’s life was filled with difficulties and hardships. A key turning point in his life was when his mother showed him a newspaper article about a man dealing with the same condition as him named Hirotada Ototake. This led him to realize he wasn’t the only one with major struggles. As time went by Nick began to embrace his situation and achieve greater things. In grade seven Nick was elected captain of his school and worked with the student council there on various fund-raising events for local charities and disability campaigns. When he was seventeen, he started to give talks at his prayer group, and eventually started his non-profit organization, Life without Limbs. Nick graduated from college at the age of 21 with a double major. 

                                                          He may be physically disabled, but he is mentally greater than me! The first thing I have to learn from Nick is to be grateful. Can you imagine? Nick is limbless, yet he can still say “thank you God, I’m alive.”! I am physically normal, yet I still often whine about things I want to have, not what I need. I have to learn to be able to be thankful for my life and for what I am. The second thing I can learn from Nick’s life is happiness is not measured by money or physical condition. Nick can still enjoy his life with his condition, so I have to enjoy my life more than he does! The third thing I can learn from Nick is about knowing the purpose of our life. I believe that God created me for a purpose, so I have to keep moving on no matter how hard my life is or how big my problems are.

                I have to start to be grateful for everything I have in my life and for what I am. I have a loving family who take a very good care of me, I can buy things I want (even though not all of them, of course), I am physically perfect, and I am still healthily living. I will also change view about happiness. Don’t count happiness based on money or your physical appearance because if I do, I will never feel satisfy nor be thankful of your life. So, I am grateful for what I am!