Greg Proffit Writing

Tag: gratitude

  • Listening To The Grateful Dead Will Teach You Everything You Need To Know — But You Must Also Dance

    Listening To The Grateful Dead Will Teach You Everything You Need To Know — But You Must Also Dance

    listening to the Grateful Dead
    Photo by Jay Blakesberg

    # 99 on my 99 Life Tips–A List is: You can learn everything you need to know in life from listening to the Grateful Dead — but you must also dance.

    The Godfather is the i-Ching, I beg to differ

    My tip is a derivative of this Godfather scene in You’ve Got Mail, the 1998 rom-com starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. In the classic scene, Hanks answers Ryans questions with references to the Godfather, assuring her it is the “answer to every question,” the “i-Ching,” and “the sum of all wisdom.” It is a brilliant scene Hanks pulls off with aplomb, throwing in some impromptu Brando imitations for emphasis.

    I love the scene, but beg to differ. My go-to source is the Grateful Dead. Within their musical catalogue is everything you need to know. Non DeadHeads don’t understand (and don’t want to know) how their music infiltrates, penetrates, and saturates a Dead fan’s mindset to the last brain cell. 

    “For the truly Deadicated, theMusic Never Stops” 

    My someday book

    I plan to write a book in which every chapter will be a life-topic with related song titles — like this sampler:

    • Love — They Love Each Other, Sugar Magnolia, Not Fade Away, Comes A Time
    • God — Hell in A Bucket, Lay Down My Brother, Wharf Rat
    • Family — Me & My Uncle, Brother Esau, Mama Tried
    • Relationships — Row Jimmy, He’s Gone, Cold Rain & Snow
    • Politics — Throwing Stones, Standing On The Moon
    • Philosophy — Terrapin Station, St. Stephen, Eyes of the World, Box of Rain
    • Justice — Dupree’s Diamond Blues, Stagger Lee, Viola Lee Blues
    • Economics — Deal, Loser, Easy Wind, Big Boss Man
    • Psychology— China Cat Sunflower, Brown-Eyed Women, The Other One
    • Death— Death Don’t Have No Mercy, To Lay Me Down, Brokedown Palace, Black Peter

    This partial, non-exhaustive listing is exemplary of how songs in their extensive repertoire have application to every aspect of life. Like I said above, you can learn everything you need to know from listening to the Grateful Dead.

    Discovering all these connections made the music the soundtrack of my life; and one of my favorite lyrics serves up advice for all life’s uncertainties:

    “If you get confused, listen to the music play”

    ~Grateful Dead: Franklin’s Tower

    One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest

    As a young adult, I got lost for several years in the hippy lifestyle (including the drug use part). I travelled cross-country following the band from show to show. The community was like none I’ve experienced since. The traveling kaleidoscope of clowns was family — a home on the road. 

    On my journey in 1985, I met Ken Kesey, author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, himself instrumental in the hey-day of what is known as the 60’s movement, and equally pivotal in the Dead’s beginnings as the house band for the infamous San Francisco Acid Tests so marvelously chronicled in Tom Wolfe’s seminal volume, The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. 

    I went to dozens and dozens of shows became more and more lost in the mysticism and mythology and mis-application of truths and nearly lost my physical and mental health in the melee. 

    A year later, I met someone even more famous than Kesey. At a show in March of 1986, I met Jesus. My life forever changed, though the music has remained the soundtrack of it. The accoutrements of drugs and touring, I left behind. They aren’t necessary. They really never were. The music itself is a healing gift. One I’m Grateful to God to still enjoy. 

    Dance as if your life depends on it

    So many Grateful Dead songs are about impending mortality. The idea is in their very name. A fellow writer on Medium wrote this beautiful essay Accepting Your Mortality is the Beginning of Living Well. I heartily concur. The Grateful Dead’s music helps remind me. And it reminds me that the only effective antidote against an encroaching death is to live, to sing, and by God, to dance.

    Is there anything more celebratory, more filled with life and joy, the kind of life-celebration powerful enough to mock death — than dancing in the face of it?

    I think often of the story in the Old Testamanet, when the Ark of The Covenant was restored to Israel and Jerusalem after spending months and years outside the city, a young King David danced in such ecstatic jubilation, he danced right out of his clothes. 

    I still dance that way — celebrating life — warding off death. Now, I spin and whirl and shake my bones in the privacy of my home. Almighty God is the recipient of my Gratitude as He watches the overflow of my pent-up life. Nothing expresses exultation for the joy of living the way dancing does. As I dance before my God, the band playing is “Jehovah’s favorite choir“, the Grateful Dead.

    Everything you need to know—Just remember to dance

    So yes, I’m quite convinced, you can learn everything you need to know in life from listening to the Grateful Dead… but you must also dance.

    “Sometimes the songs that we hear are just songs of our own.”

    ~ Grateful Dead: Eyes Of The World
  • Do You Really Want What You Deserve?

    Do You Really Want What You Deserve?

    picture of coffee cup, pen, and napkin on which is written I deserve better
    “I deserve better” is a positive affirmation in one context, and a fallacy in another

    # 36 on my, 99 Life Tips – A List is: No one would want what he truly deserves in life.

    If life was just, or even fair; if karma was instant, no one would want what they truly deserve. This ”tip” is more an assertion to be absorbed and assimilated than something to be practiced. I include it because it falls into the broad category of ”wrong thinking” which is the culprit in 90% of life’s woes. This statement is related to another of my ”assertive” tips, #73, which says Happiness = Reality – Expectations, a topic I’ve written about in another post.

    How To Decide What We Deserve?

    To deserve means to be worthy of, or to merit, either a reward, or a punishment. The definition implies a standard, or a benchmark. It implies rules. It involves a ruler, and a judge. The idea of deserving something requires a comparative analysis. Your character and actions are measured against some objective criteria. Are you compared to your neighbor, your co-worker, your child, your spouse, Jesus? Or perhaps just against written law. 

    Clearly, these are relative comparisons, unique to each individual. I may behave better than Charles Manson, or even better than my overbearingly meddlesome neighbor on NextDoor, but not as well as Mother Teresa, so…what do I deserve?

    Real Crime Deserves Real Punishment

    Undoubtedly, there are crimes demanding justice, and deserving of punishment. Swift punishment, equitably applied, is a sine qua non of a healthy, functioning society. I am not ignoring the existence of crime, or the necessity of law enforcement and a functional criminal justice system. Some crimes deserve extreme sanction. I am not discounting these truths.

    Moral vs. Transactional Context

    Rather, we are examining the common day-to-day attitudes and beliefs we feel about what we deserve. Because, most people think they deserve better than they get. Or if something good happens, they’re convinced they ”deserved” it. They believe they are entitled to good things on some moral basis. It is this notion I’m addressing.

    On the other hand, in a transactional context such as a salary negotiation, in general, you should refuse to accept less than you deserve. Accepting less than what is merited in the workplace diminishes not only your paycheck, but devalues you as a person. It causes a cascading loss of morale that undermines personal confidence and self-esteem. When possible, it is better to walk away from an underpaying job, than suffer the financial and psychological harm that results from staying in it. This will be the subject of another post.

    Please consider the differing contexts as you evaluate and incorporate my comments.

    Potential Merit On A 10-Point Scale

    But, let us suppose our character and actions could be pegged on a 10-point scale with each of us starting with 10 as a maximum possible score. Let us call this our ”Potential Merit”. That is not difficult to conceive. We do each possess an upper limit, representing the possibility of faultless moral character and behavior, even though my hypothetical “potential merit” scoring matrix doesn’t really exist.

    Your level of Potential Merit may provide greater opportunities for good deeds than mine, since that will differ according to our respective circumstances, but it cannot surpass mine on a raw 10-point scale; with 10 being the highest possible score. At maximum potential, everyone starts at 10. This score represents faultless moral behavior.

    Let’s also suppose the existence of some spiritual or cosmic ”assessors” grading you at every moment. They are making comparisons of your actual performance against your potential performance to determine what you merit, that is, what you deserve. There is no grading curve. Every fault, every wrong word and deed hammers your score with de-merits. The only way to merit (deserve) good results is to consistently grade out at 10, and never dip below your potential. Yet, even grading out at 10 would be no guarantee of only good results given the vagaries of life. Do you still want what you deserve? I don’t.

    This is why, at every moment, I will opt for mercy over justice, and grace over wages. I know what I deserve in life, and God help me, I do not want it. I am living the most amazing life, on borrowed time, that I absolutely and completely do not deserve. My hunch is that you are too.

    Mercy, Forgiveness, and Gratitude

    Mercy and forgiveness do not exist in a vacuum. They are meaningless unless there is an impending judgement and sentencing. The only suitable candidates for mercy are those earmarked for punishment. Mercy is not something one deserves, or can earn. Justice is what we deserve. 

    Knowing this provides innumerable opportunities for gratitude. Every good thing you experience in life is made sweeter when accompanied with the recognition that you truly don’t deserve it. The experience of good things becomes the receiving of gifts for which to be profoundly thankful. And hopefully, this realization will prompt you to show mercy when it’s your time to sit on the judgement seat, considering you don’t want what you truly deserve in life, either.

  • Now, Gratitude Is

    Now, Gratitude Is

    Gratitude is slowing down to savor and enjoy a cup of coffee like the woman pictured here.
    Slow down, savor, appreciate, enjoy. Now, Gratitude is. (Adobe Stock Image licensed to Author)

    # 12 on my, 99 Life Tips – A List is: Gratitude works its magic in the moment you become aware of something for which to be thankful. The more aware you become, the more the magic of gratitude will follow you throughout your day. It doesn’t work the same when practiced as a generalized, “I’m thankful for my life.” No, gratitude works best and strongest within the context of contemporaneous specificity. 

    By word count, this is my longest tip. Still, if I was limited to only one tip, this would be it. This one has the most potential to produce positive, repeatable results. As stated, gratitude works best and strongest within the context of contemporaneous specificity. While correct, the gist can be summed up with: Now, Gratitude is.

    But allow me to try for more clarity. Gratitude works most deeply, and its effects are experienced most fully, in specific, definable, instantaneous and momentary awarenesses of appreciation. Hmmm…that’s worse. Try this: Gratitude is the sense of appreciation, wonder, and thankfulness for a single, specific thing, at a single specific moment in time. Yes, that’s closer to it. Now, Gratitude is.

    Many believe they are grateful who ”count their blessings”, and can recite instances of good fortune for which they undoubtedly feel thankful as they remember them. But this type of gratitude is a lame imposter compared to the practice of gratitude I’m trying to capture with feeble words. Now, Gratitude is.

    When Does Gratitude Happen? Now…

    The first words of Hebrews 11:1 say, ”Now, Faith Is…”. I could meditate, write, and preach on this segment of a verse forever. Briefly, it declares the season in which faith can be exercised. That season is ”Now”. I submit, true gratitude is the same. Now, Gratitude is. Either Gratitude happens right now, this moment, at the exact instant when the pleasure for which gratitude is the deepest and only appropriate response, or it doesn’t happen at all.

    True gratitude is the antithesis, and therefore the antidote, to depression and anxiety. It is not a backward looking remembrance. Nor, is it a journal chronicling pleasant things past. Rather, It is the present tense inhalation of appreciation for the present tense experience of the simplest pleasure. It is the pause to savor that stops time and transforms a right now moment of pleasure into an eternity. Gratitude is the observant mind grasping what makes pleasure pleasurable. And it is the satisfied inner accountant who says, “this is enough.” This awareness is one of profound appreciation and thanksgiving for the experience. And it is a sense of incredible awe at being capable of enjoying such an experience. No, true gratitude and depression cannot coexist. Now, Gratitude is.

    Thus, gratitude is to be found in the first savored sip of freshly brewed, creamy coffee. Likewise, it is present at the first light of dawn. Similarly, for the grateful observer, it is the glimpse of Orion in the night sky, or the faintest outline of the crescent moon against a pale blue morning. Gratitude feels the smile on a baby’s face. And, it also invests the good-morning kiss of your love with all the the courage and fortitude you need to face the entire day. Gratitude is the warm coat you pull on against a chill wind. And can also be the childlike glee of a soft spring rain against your upturned face. Are you beginning to see? Now, Gratitude is.

    Practiced this way, as a sort of “appreciation radar,” gratitude becomes a bulwark against almost every mental ailment, while enriching and elevating everything in its scope. And friends, there are as many different opportunities to practice it as moments in a day. For,…Now Gratitude is.

    Be grateful therefore, and live. Now, Gratitude is.

  • Do Not Be Afraid Of Feeling Bad – It’s Good For You

    young man slumped against a wall in a dark hallway feeling bad
    Emotional moment: man sitting holding face in hands, stressed, sad, feeling bad, depressed, disappointed. We’ve all been here.

    # 11 on my, 99 Life Tips – A List is: Do not be afraid of feeling bad. There are things to feel bad about, and the contrast is a wonderful reminder of why gratitude is so important.

    This is one of the most important Life Tips. It also swims upstream against the prevailing American cultural and social ethic. We are a country terrified of feeling bad. So, we medicate. We pre-medicate prophylactically to prevent even the chance we might feel bad. We’re so afraid to feel bad, we self-medicate. But you do not to be afraid of feeling bad. If you don’t know both how to, and when to, feel bad; if you make yourself artificially numb to negative feelings, then neither will you experience the full heights of feeling good.

    This one has been difficult to learn. Obviously, one doesn’t learn to feel bad by being gifted a million bucks. I heard a preacher once say that if you pray and ask God to take away your bitterness, He won’t do it by giving you a Cadillac. The point being, we all learn to feel bad by hard practice. But face it, this life deals everyone some hard, hard blows eventually. Not to be morbid, depressing, or nihilistic, but everyone you love is going to die some day. And you will join them if not precede them. This unavoidable truth doesn’t exactly feel like Disney World.

    But what do we do with that truth? I say, let’s wring all the pleasure and joy and love out of this short ride on the merry-go-round that we possibly can. And, let’s do so in the knowledge that being human is the experience of the full gamut of emotion: from heart-crushing grief to soul-enriching joy. We will face the things in life that feel bad and become more resilient, more capable of experiencing appropriate emotional responses, and more grateful.

    And here is the most important point. You will feel the worst over the loss of something you loved the most. They are two sides of the same coin. It is impossible to feel bad over something you couldn’t care less about. Bad feelings are the result when something that made us feel good goes missing, or is lost to us in some way.

    If you are afraid of feeling bad, my advice is never, NEVER, let yourself attach to anything that makes you feel good. 

    ”It all rolls into One.

    And nothing comes for free.

    There’s nothing you can hold

    for very long.”

    ~ Grateful Dead: Stella Blue

    It is important that we allow ourselves to put on the sweater of our bad feelings as Morrie would remind us in Mitch Albom’s excellent book Tuesdays with Morrie. There are things that will always bring some measure of hurt, pain, or sadness when we reflect on them. This is as it should be. Some things in life just hurt. This is the way of life. How dare we try to escape that by numbing out? To do so is to deny the very thing that makes us human. That sweater of pain will always feel bad whenever we choose to put it on. But we can also take it off and not wear it all day, every day.

    No friends, Do not be afraid of feeling bad. We are the species that loves, and marries, and feasts, and dances in the face of future imminent death. There is an undercurrent of sadness that accompanies our reality. You can accept that fact, face it, and choose to live as full of gratitude for the myriad good things that come your way in a world where nothing lasts forever, or you can numb out in the effort to escape it. Just be aware that if you are afraid of feeling bad, you’ll disqualify yourself from feeling good, really good.

    NOTE: I am not negating the fact of clinical depression, or crippling anxiety. Nor am I either vilifying or castigating those who suffer from these medical conditions. These conditions supersede mere emotional states. However, as this article from February, 2021 suggests, the over-prescription of psychiatric drugs is not without serious drawbacks, especially when many cases of depression and anxiety are contextual, non-pharmacological, and would respond better to psychotherapy than to dependence on medications.

    As a final thought on this topic, let me leave you with this beautiful song, from Rich Mullins, who was tragically killed way too young on his way back from a free benefit concert for Native Americans. A horribly sad thing indeed:

    “There’s bound to come some trouble to your life

    But that ain’t nothing to be afraid of

    There’s bound to come some trouble to your life

    But that ain’t no reason to fear”

    ~ Rich Mullins: Bound to Come Some Trouble

  • Look What’s In Your Hand

    There You Are! You Made It To Today! Nice!

    You have made it to today. Congratulations! No, I’m definitely not being facetious. If you are reading this you’ve proven that you have what it takes to marshal your resources, persevere in the daily grind, overcome obstacles, and succeed in life. Have you ever stopped to realize the truth of what you just read? It has taken a series of daily miracles to make it here! Have you considered that? If not, the appropriate response to that recognition should be gratitude. 

    The simple, undeniable fact of being alive…again..today…this day, is enough evidence to prove you know how to do this life thing. With all that you’ve been through, it is a remarkable achievement to keep showing up!

    If you don’t feel like the reminder is a big deal – no, a Really Big Deal, then you probably take a lot of unpleasant rides on the emotional roller coaster. Am I right? I can make that guess with confidence, knowing that a consistently positive emotional state is sustained by an accurate accounting and valuation of what you have. It is impossible to be happy while anxious and focused on what you don’t have.

    Simply re-aligning your focus can change your life.

    ”I can tell your future

    just look what’s in your hand.

    But I can’t stop for nothing

    I’m just playin’ in the band.”

    ~Grateful Dead: Playin’ In The Band

    The focus of this site

    This post and site is devoted to helping you look at what’s already in your hand. Once you see that you’ve had everything you’ve needed, really needed, to get to today; you will gain a confidence that will see you through every storm to arrive at whatever port tomorrow brings your way. Remind yourself, that if you’ve made it to today, the appropriate response is gratitude.

    So, stop for a moment and allow yourself to feel grateful that you’ve made it this far, that you’re still here, that you’ve been perfectly equipped to get to this point in your life. We’ll learn how to focus that appreciation onto the smallest things, the simplest occurrences, the thousand and one simple pleasures that enrich your life every day.

    You’re going to learn how to see what you have, simply by looking for it, and looking at it. And that’s going to spark a new way of seeing everything else about this world. Gratitude for the smallest of blessings can turn this entire world into a museum of amazement for you.