A Quick and Easy Remedy for the Mopes

If I were a genius scientist, or doctor, or whatever, I would change the MMR vaccine to the MMMR vaccine: measles, mumps, mopes, and rubella. Because, to be honest, who even gets those other things anyway? A few days ago, I was suffering from a very bad case of the mopes, and the doctor's office told me that they couldn't throw in an extra "M" just for the fun of it, so all I could do was cry it out, right? Wrong! I found a equally genius home-remedy sitting on my bookshelf, in the form of a gratitude journal I was given five years ago, and only wrote in six times. This is it:

I just felt like I should open it up and give it another try.  This is the inside: "I am grateful..." and then blanks:

At first, I just stared at the page, wondering how I could ever think of enough things to fill it, but then I thought of how my grandma always tells me how happy she is that I am home for the summer (which I need to hear, because sometimes I'm not glad that I chose to come home, and she helps me feel better about it). I wrote it down.  Suddenly, I was hit by a wave of things I was thankful for that day, and it took maybe five minutes to fill the page.  I knew I was on the way to recovery, and the next morning I woke up happy again.

So the moral of this story is that hollistic home remedy medicine rocks! No, actually the lesson I learned is that  gratitude is the easiest way to get over a bout with the third M.  So, for anyone out there who is feeling a little under the weather today,  find yourself a notebook (it doens't have to be all cutesy like mine, but lets face it--with a little mod podge and some scrapbook paper, any notebook can get its cutesy on) and give it a try. 

To end this post, here's a my favorite quote on gratitude, courtesy of Jenkin Lloyd Jones:

"Anyone who imagines that bliss is normal is going to waste a lot of time running around shouting that he has been robbed.  The fact is that most putts don't drop, most beef is tough, most children grow up to be just people, most successful marriages require a high degree of mutual toleration, and most jobs are more often dull than otherwise.  Life is just like an old time rail journey...delays, sidetracks, smoke, dust, cinders, and jolts, interspersed only occasionally by beautiful vistas and thrilling bursts of speed.  The trick is to thank the Lord for letting you have the ride."