‘Now say thank you!’

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I was picking up my groceries at the week market, and while waiting at the bakery I saw a youngster ~ she must have been three or four years old ~ be given a cookie. It brought a sparkle in her eyes and a bright smile on her face ~ and as she turned to her mom, her mom told her: ‘Now say thank you!’
She turned back to the person behind the counter and said: ‘Thank you’. It was immediately reinforced by her mom who said: ‘That’s a good girl!’

It is just one of those things we learn along the way ~ when we are given something, we say ‘thank you’. Whether it is a cookie when we are a youngster, presents on our birthday, a job well done, or good service in a restaurant ~ a ‘thank you’ is in order.

Later on in life we may come to the realization that there are a lot of things to be thankful for. To be alive, to be healthy, to be able to pay the bills, to have work, to have time off... And then there are family, friends, partners, co-workers... From a more spiritual perspective, being thankful for the good things that are happening in our lives, and for the ‘bad things’ as they provide the ‘growth opportunities’ on our life paths... The list goes on and on and on. And while we are likely to appreciate and be grateful for each and all of these things every single day of our lives, we may not say ‘thank you’ quite as often as we were taught to when we were kids.

Yet, as adults we don’t tell one another ‘Now say thank you!’, ‘That’s a good girl!’, ‘That’s a good boy!’.
When the gratitude is not forthcoming ~ whether that is factually true or in personal perception ~ it is a different discussion entirely when we have grown up. And it is hardly ever a pure black-and-white story. Suddenly things like body language, choice of words, tone of voice, and even the level of our energy at that moment come into the picture.
For instance, while one person may feel he has done a great job with something and the other person is not responding to it and therefore is not thankful or appreciative for our hard work ~ the other person may have been really busy themselves and simply not have had the time to see what great job has been done... In which case anything along the (more grown up) lines of ‘Now say thank you!’ is totally besides the point...

As it turns out, most people are grateful, appreciative people, even when they don’t say ‘thank you’ at every chance they get. And when the appreciation is not expressed right when you want to receive it ~ it is not to be taken personally...
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