There isn't just one approach. You might choose items made locally; or by individuals; or from small manufacturers that treat their employees well. If you're not buying directly from the supplier, you will be considering the retailer too. Let's call it "conscious" gift shopping. The spiritual principle here is to consider the whole gift: what it will mean to the recipient; what it's made of; how it was made; who made it; how it got to your hands. I think everyone can embrace supporting individual craftspeople and small businesses over multinational corporations. At least for Christmas.

When you find yourself feeling particularly ungrateful about your life — or your spiritual director or friend points out to you that you are — you can stop and remind yourself of all the things for which you can be grateful.

There are some obvious things. You often hear people say, "at least I've got my health." That might sound trite, but if you have ever experienced a serious loss of your own good health and then gotten it back, or if you or to someone close to you is deprived permanently of good health, you will know that good health is a great blessing. Another common item is family — partners, parents, children: whoever loves you unconditionally and gives you sustenance and support.

Not half full or half empty — just half full

Gratitude list items can also be seemingly trivial things — or at least things that might seem so to someone else. And many things can be seen as blessings or negatives. For example, I do not live with anyone else. I could focus on and feed feelings of loneliness. But I can also be grateful for the control I have over my environment and how easy it is to meditate and have silence when I want it. (Ask anyone with a big family about how precious that is!)

It's important, even though this is a list, to not fall into thinking of it as a two-sided ledger. It's not "I'm alone but at least I have peace and quiet."  It's, "I can have peace and quiet whenever I want in my home."

It's not about seeing our world's cup as half full rather than half empty. Because the truth is everyone, and I mean everyone, has things they can be grateful for and things they can be ungrateful for. It's about paying attention to the part that's full. Who cares about what you don't have? Seriously. Think about that for a moment.

Focusing on what we don't have, on expectations of things that have not materialized for us, only leads to anxiety and self-pity. I'm not saying there is no place for wanting to create a more abundant life, but that's not the way. Paradoxically — as are most great spiritual principles — it is by being content with what we have that we are open to seeing clearly what is around us, and seeing new opportunities.

I often hear people talking about living in the present moment as if it is a struggle, some cosmic game of attempting to grasp something that is fleeting, illusory. They say things like, "the moment I have it, it's gone." While this is true and can be frustrating, the last thing present moment awareness is about is grabbing serenity. I have always liked the metaphor of the river (borrowed from my Christian contemplative practice of centering prayer) in talking of the flow of thoughts. Imagine the stream of consciousness as a river, with boats and debris representing thoughts. You're sitting on the bank of the river watching it. Normal awareness has you looking at each individual boat-thought, following it down the river with your eyes -- and to strain the metaphor, getting on it and opening hatches -- then suddenly shifting your awareness to another boat and so on. If your mind is particularly cluttered, you can feel overwhelmed by all the boats you have to look at and it can feel like that classic I Love Lucy skit with the conveyor belt at the chocolate factory, like you're falling behind and they start slipping by. There can be a sense of panic that a thought that's getting past you without attention is important and you're missing it.

Present moment awareness is simply sitting on the bank and watching the river, not the boats. Boats cross your field of vision and you do see them, but you don't follow them with your eyes or get on them. They're not out of focus, but you don't focus on them.

My last column, about waiting patiently for a late bus, provoked some interesting comments and reactions (on the site and directly) that tease out the bigger issues involved. While I wrote about waiting for someone who's late, two commenters brought up the flipside of the same time management coin -- what to do when you're going to be late yourself through no fault of your own. Fellow Busted Halo contributor Ginny Moyer wrote...]]> http://bustedhalo.com/features/what-works-53-martha-and-mary/feed 0 http://bustedhalo.com/features/what-works-52-waiting-patiently http://bustedhalo.com/features/what-works-52-waiting-patiently#comments Thu, 25 Aug 2011 07:05:57 +0000 Phil Fox Rose http://bustedhalo.com/?p=15119 http://bustedhalo.com/features/what-works-52-waiting-patiently/feed 8 http://bustedhalo.com/features/what-works-51-the-pala-challenge http://bustedhalo.com/features/what-works-51-the-pala-challenge#comments Thu, 11 Aug 2011 07:06:26 +0000 Phil Fox Rose http://bustedhalo.com/?p=14918 http://bustedhalo.com/features/what-works-51-the-pala-challenge/feed 0 http://bustedhalo.com/features/what-works-50-vacation-advice-from-the-pope http://bustedhalo.com/features/what-works-50-vacation-advice-from-the-pope#comments Mon, 01 Aug 2011 07:05:52 +0000 Phil Fox Rose http://bustedhalo.com/?p=14831

The pope has made several comments this year concerning vacations, which were highlighted in a piece on the Vatican Radio website. Summer is halfway over already, but he touches on some powerful ideas, so while there's still time, let's take a look.

Pope Benedict offers two basic goals for our vacation besides relaxation:

• spending time with others
• spending time with God

It's one thing to spend an hour or two with a person, or to be with family or a partner all the time in the daily routines of life, but there's something special (and sometimes challenging) about travelling together. Quality time is a great thing, but the hours of non-quality time during a vacation -- in cars, waiting at airports, between events -- create a different kind of intimacy.

And as far as what vacation to choose, are you challenged by the pope's suggestion to spend time with others? Is there a visit to family that you could do instead of that beach vacation which will yield greater fruit in the long run? Maybe not. And not every vacation should be about visiting family. Getaways are valuable too. But it's worth asking yourself.

It's obvious how to spend time with other people -- bring them along or go to them -- but how do we spend time with God while on vacation? The pope offers three ideas, and we'll explore each one a little...

Despite how highly I value and seek out serenity, I am linked continuously to my workplace and other obligations, so it's all too easy to feel pressured by the things I could be doing -- like Fran in Black Books, cursing under her breath while answering her cell phone as she's running late for yoga.

The seeds were planted centuries ago with the Puritan work ethic -- epitomized by Isaac Watt's 1700s hymn for children praising the worker bee, which includes the lines:

In works of labour or of skill,
I would be busy too;
For Satan finds some mischief still
For idle hands to do.

Meat-free Fridays were a given from at least the ninth century, but it seems that when things were loosened in the 1960s, Catholics said a collective sigh of, "Well, glad that nuisance is over," and started eating meat seven days a week. The Church never removed the requirement that one do something penitential every Friday (abstinence being one option), but many Catholics I talk to don't even know this. I'd like to join with the English and Welsh bishops in suggesting a return to the tradition of meat-free Fridays.

The fact that I live in a city, without any outdoor space of my own — no backyard or balcony — doesn't mean it's difficult to make this happen. There are parks all around, and just a walk in the sun down city streets can be enriching. For example, after working in the office, I often go to a park and spent a little time birdwatching or just strolling.

And contrary to all the neo-Luddite moaning out there, technology is now making it easier to stay connected with the non-technological world. Many of the advances in recent years have focused on untethering people from their desks. I am writing this column on my iPad; not only can I write it but even file it while sitting on a log in the middle of the woods, or on the grass in a city park. (OK, well, as long as there's an AT&T signal.)