Gratitude and the Story We Share: A Thanksgiving Letter

Dear Wordplayers,

Every year around this time, I look forward to taking a moment to write you this note. It gives me an opportunity to sink in and contemplate the depths of my gratitude.

The older I get, the more I believe gratitude is the secret sauce. Without it, nothing is good. With it, all of life is miraculous. I don’t believe gratitude is a feeling, any more than love is. It is a state of being, a frequency we must choose to embody. It is a conscious choice.

Photography by Mackenzie Westphal.

It is also a force that changes the world—perhaps, ironically, less because it demands change and more because it is focused on accepting and celebrating exactly what is.

Gratitude is relentless optimism. It is finding the capacity, however small and unlikely, to believe that life has purpose, that tragedy is somehow worthwhile, that the story always arcs.

I am deeply grateful for the arcs my life has taken me on. I am even more grateful for the often miraculous ability to find gratitude even at the lowest moments of those arcs—and to get to see how often (always, really) that gratitude is eventually rewarded beyond my wildest hopes.

I’m grateful to my lifelong love for and devotion to story—which has given me the foundation to see the patterns and the arcs, not just in novels and in films, but in my own life–to know with some certainty where I may be within the larger cycle—to feel the play of deeper themes and to trust the utter reliability of story in its inherent search for expansion, truth, and goodness.

I’m grateful to be a writer, a storyteller. I’m grateful to be a story theorist—to get to experience not just story, but Story.

And I’m so grateful I get to share this journey with all of you. You are a part of my story, my meaning, my purpose. Like any good story, I do not know exactly what happens next. But I do know where we have been. I know that we have journeyed together for almost 20 years now. I have gotten to witness your goodness, your determination, your graciousness, your grit, your curiosity, your brilliance, your humility, and your drive. Thank you, thank you, thank you for all of that—for being you, being here, and being courageous enough to tell your stories.

Thank you, and happy Thanksgiving!

P.S. Only a handful of days left on my Black Friday sale: 25% off every product in my store, including my books, workbooks, brand-new worksheets, courses, software, and writing meditations.

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