This week Americans will celebrate Thanksgiving: A day known for turkey and stuffing. A day known for glamorous parades and shopping bargains. A day immediate and extended families across the nation gather together for dinner at 4 p.m. It represents a unique holiday, one that members of religious and secular households deem worthy of celebration.
Expressing gratitude and appreciation for one’s blessings represents a universal ideal. Maintaining gratitude for one’s blessings after Thanksgiving represents a universal struggle. Expressing gratitude for one’s blessings represents a key religious value. Religious Jews offer several dozen prayers and blessings of thanksgiving daily. Yet, many cannot express gratitude beyond the required daily prayers.
Personal experience has suggested one’s preoccupation over accomplishing a specific goal hinders appreciation for one’s blessings. Bachelors immersed in the pursuit of a spouse find it difficult to be grateful for their supportive family and stable employment. Unemployed individuals immersed in the pursuit of a job have difficulties expressing appreciation for their good health and supportive family. Sick individuals immersed in the pursuit of a cure find the blessings of stable income and marriage challenging to embrace.
Several women from Tanach became preoccupied with the goal of bearing children and lost their appreciation for life’s blessings. Sarah enjoyed a wonderful marriage to Avraham, great wealth, and great physical health. Yet, Sarah’s years of unsuccessful attempts to bear children prompted her to express immense disappointment. Rivka relayed strong words of distress to Yitzchak over years of unsuccessful attempts at childbearing. Rachel held the title of Yaakov’s favorite wife. Channa held the title of Elkanah’s favorite wife. Yet, both despaired over their inability to accomplish the task of childbearing. Each woman allowed the outcome of one major goal to compromise their gratitude for life’s blessings.
Four years ago, I let preoccupations over the pursuit of one goal compromise my gratitude for life’s blessings. Between the years 2019 and 2020 several close friends got married. This stretch included a nonstop barrage of weddings and aufrufs for me. Labor Day of 2020 represented the season’s final wedding. It took place on a cloudy day in the Five Towns. Upon the chuppah’s conclusion it began to pour. Several friends and mentors of the groom stood underneath the bar for shelter. One of these mentors included a prominent rabbi. A black suit and silver tie enveloped the middle-aged man’s chest, a black hat leaned atop his gray-haired head, and a bright smile radiated across his face. During the downpour I introduced myself. Upon the completion of small talk, a discussion about my mixed emotions ensued.
“Rabbi, I’m very happy Charles (pseudonym) got married. I’m sure they will do great things together. But it’s also frustrating that I’m single. To go from person to person, shadchan to shadchan, date to date, and still be at the same place where I started is difficult. Some of my friends only dated one person before they met their wife. I should be happier for Charles, but it’s really hard to be single, rabbi.”
The bearded rabbi put one hand around my shoulder and offered me these memorable words of chizuk. “Being single is tough. Life is hard and filled with challenges. Each person’s reward will be waiting for them after they die. But just because life is hard, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t count your blessings.” This advice introduced me to a dialectic (two opposites can be true simultaneously): One the one hand, many single people experience loneliness and have immense love with no spouse to share it with. At the same time, many single people have good health, and belong to a welcoming and vibrant Jewish community. Many unmarried people have the good fortune to be employed, the good fortune to have living grandparents, to have younger siblings to play board games with, and to have religious mentors to learn from. It’s important to remember that as challenging as things might be, each person can make room for gratitude amid the struggle.
After eating turkey and pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving, ponder your relationship with gratitude. What things do you have to be grateful for? Does the current pursuit of one goal compromise your gratitude for goals you’ve already achieved, for gifts you already have? The Mishna in Pirkei Avot states, Ezeh hu Ashir, Hasmeach bechelco—Who is rich? Someone who is grateful for what they have.
* Edited by Rabbi Neil Fleischmann
