Gratitude Appreciates Misery
Growing up in Colombia, I learned about relative hardship
I had a girlfriend who used to say that looking at other people’s pain and realizing that your situation was not as bad as theirs was the dumbest thing any human being could do.
Really? The dumbest?
I can think of a few things that are dumber and the older I grow, the more I can think of dumber things.
As you may have guessed, I don’t know that I agree. At times, our gratitude can be filled by the double-edged sword of comparing ourselves to others.
My sister and I laugh about the stories we share of growing up in Colombia. We felt like we were growing up poor, smacked right in the middle of the middle class. Our friends had money, and we had struggles.
However, it never felt right to complain about not having more money to belong to a country club when we knew families living in a shack next to a dumpster with dirt instead of flooring. It would feel like asking a surgeon to stop an open heart surgery to help you with a splinter in your thumb.
My mom hates it when we talk about those times because she feels it reflects poorly on her. We don’t think it does. We would never think about it in that way.
