From Charlie: “Sunshine. I am most grateful for sunshine. When I feel the sun warm my body, especially on a cold day, it reminds me how connected I feel to everything around me. My cells soak up the sunshine and then I store that within my body. When my human friends come in at night, I then spread my sunshine to them to help brighten the end of their day. I like making people feel joyful. Then I know I have done a good job and it’s been a good day.”
From Eloise: “My list of things to be grateful for is so long that you don’t have time to read it. People need to make more time to be grateful. I’m finding this to be a trend. Hurry. Hurry. Hurry. You don’t take time to enjoy what you are doing. For example, when my food comes, I savor every single bite. I bet you that you don’t even remember what you just ate or what it tasted like. I know what each and every morsel tasted like. I know when it smells like it’s going to rain outside or snow. I know when the flowers are going to open. I can even tell different grasses apart simply because I know what it smells like around me. When you are truly grateful for the little everyday things that sustain you, you will start to feel great joy over the smallest parts of your daily life. That is true gratitude. I know I have found mine!”
From Dusty: “I am grateful for times when it is quiet. Sometimes humans make an awful lot of noise. I wonder how they keep functioning like that actually. I like it when it gets really quiet. I love hearing the breeze in the trees or the rain on a quiet day. I love the stillness of the nighttime and the softness of the winter. Actually, when it is really quiet, I also can hear the gentle breathing of my other cat friends in our room. There is something about that simple sound that brings such peace to me. There is peace in knowing others are breathing with you in the same quiet and that together we are creating a simple kind of peace in the world. I wish that people could find more quiet and stillness in their day. I think they’d be a lot happier.”
From Belle: “I am grateful for my freedom to live life the way I wanted to live it. Most people would have decided I was quite useless and would have ended my life as I would have become an inconvenience. I am grateful to live in a place where I can grow old and frail and not have to be the perfect horse or to have ever had to perform to ideals that I could not achieve. I was simply allowed to be me. I am grateful for every opportunity of kindness that has ever been shown to me. I am grateful for the patience that has been given my way. But mostly, I am grateful for the chance to live my life looking for the good in each day – and to have found so much of it.”
From Carley: “I may be tiny, but I am not insignificant. If you think I’m small, you’ll second guess that when you hear my huge voice! I am bigger inside than I look. And I want people to know that just because some of us are little, doesn’t mean that we matter less. I think people need to stop looking at things as if some are greater than others and that those who are lesser should be scorned. Life is too precious to waste on such things. I don’t understand it myself. I think each one of us has something special to offer. I love reaching out to touch people. And I love it even more when they appreciate that I do that. That means they care enough to know more about me. I am grateful to have a chance to be seen for being me.”
From Minnie: “This has been a year of learning for me. I moved here to a new home away from my original flock of sheep. Life here is different. I just kind of hid out in the flock and was fine. But here, I live with one other sheep, Daisy. Suddenly, I couldn’t just hide anymore. And I had to find a way to participate with others. I am just learning how to be calm in my body and to think before I leap. That hasn’t been easy for me. But I’m grateful to Daisy for helping me see that not everything in life has to be challenging or frightening. And I’m learning to trust more and have fun. I’m grateful to be here. And I’m grateful to learn about friendship.”