No Giving It Up

I'm thankful that the whole not giving up thing is so contagious, and I'm even more thankful that I keep picking it up from my own self. See, I've just realized today that the more I take certain risks, the more I'm willing to fight for something, the easier and the more natural the decision not to give up next time comes to me, the more determined I am to succeed. Totally awesome how this thing seems to work!

Unzipped

I'm thankful for yet another funny episode at work (some of the previous ones included me having chocolate stains on my butt, me ending up being bare legged at work and wearing plastic bags). It took me 5 (FIVE!!) hours to realize why my booties felt so loose all of a sudden - turns out, I forgot to zip them before leaving for work and have been walking around the office in undone shoes for more than half a working day. I'm thankful for it, because when I noticed it made me laugh and lifted my mood instantly. I'm still giggling!

P.S. Zipped shoes feel so good on my feet... I think I'm thankful for the feeling of zipped shoes too then!

Excitement

I'm thankful for a feeling of excitement. No matter the source or reason,  it's a feeling like no other!

Simply

I'm just simply thankful for today. For simply being alive, for being able to plan my day and to go about my simple day filled with good news and fulfilled expectations. I'm thankful for the simple day that was simply out of the ordinary - just like every day should be.

Not Your Average Young Girl

I'm thankful for having some very unusual and unexpected life experiences (the memories are fantastic) that are not so common among people from my walk of life and definately not common among people my age. My favorites would have to be me assisting in helping a cow deliver her calf baby and my pilgrimage trip through a few Russia’s holy towns (especially so since I am not religious at all). Yes, I'm pretty crazy if you're wondering (I'm smiling as I type this). Any unusual experiences you're willing to openly share on the internet? No?

I Know I Can

I'm thankful for people who discourage and make you question yourself and your ideas. Encountering such people puts your aspirations to the test, leaving out the unnecessary things and making space for the worthy ones, and it also makes you really appreciate those people in your life who give you strength and make you believe in yourself and what you do.

Vitamin D

One of the thankful people on The 'Thank You' Project's Facebook page reminded me I have never given thanks to and for the Sun, which is pretty amusing since I love it so much - talk about taking for granted the very things that most deserve our gratitude!.. Sun equals life, basically! I'm thankful for the energizing and mood lifting effect the Sun has always had on me - I swear I'm a much more cheerful person when it's the sunny season here where I live. Do you change when it's sunny?

SMS Notifications

I'm thankful for the SMS notification service - it's so handy!

En Route

On the way to work I was crossing a road and had to turn my head to see if the road was car free... And there was this super cool movie like moment when I turn my head, the sun shines right between the frame of my sunglasses and my left eye with its soft yellow haze, and the music in the song that was playing in my iPhone slowly stops (and starts again as I turn my head back) - it was just a mere seceond maybe, and all of that happened at the same time in one tiny moment... It felt ridiculously cool, and I'm thankful for living it!

Looking Up

I'm thankful that things seem to be looking up for me travelling wise... After a year of totally random and inexplicable obstacles that kept getting in the way each time I tried to make a trip to anywhere happen, having been able to book tickets feels like a miracle. Hope I'm not speaking too soon, ha! Anyway, I am thankful for the opportunity that seems to be real this time!

Once Upon a Time

I'm thankful for those simply good days when everything just clicks and goes smoothly. Those days are especially cool when you just know on the inside that everything's going to turn out exactly the way you've planned  - you just know it and you don't stress about it.

Office Equipment

I'm thankful that I can use my office equipment for personal purposes too, any time I need it. This is super handy, and sometimes proves to be super useful and it saves time too!

Teach You, Teach Me

Back in school I really disliked and disrespected some of the teachers' approach to their job. Teaching is a hard work, and it was hard for me to understand why someone who is impatient and can't get along with children would want to be a teacher. But at least seeing bad teachers at work made me feel grateful to those rare ones who had real knowledge in their field of expertise, real passion for sharing what they knew and real talent in explaining the virtues of their subjects and really educating their students. 

With this being said, a huge enourmous thank you goes to my physics teacher in high school - Irina Vladimirovna S.! (Not sure if I should mention her full name). As for college, my sincere thank you goes to my civil law professor Daniil Viktorovich Ch. And if I'm being completely honest here, there's something I most probably should and do feel ashamed of before these great people and exceptional teachers. In a way, I didn't live up to their high expectations of me, and maybe I should've never put effort in gaining their trust and respect in the first place. Thank you so much and I am sorry.

Genes

I'm thankful for my genes. When I think of the personality traits me and my parents have in common, I always feel like I've only taken the best my mom and dad had to offer in terms of temper, habits and such. The mix makes me a very contradictory person at times, but I kind of like this about myself, so I really don't mind. I'm also thankful I didn't inherit some of their traits I personally don't like, ha.

Practice What You Preach

I'm not going to point fingers at anyone, but I'm thankful to one of my family members for unknowingly and unwillingly teaching me a very good thing - not to tell others to do something a certain way if I don't do it this way myself. By always giving me advice they themselves don't follow, they really taught me to always practice what I preach.

Commute to Work

My office might not be situated in the most fabulous area of the city, but getting to see something like this every day when leaving work during the colder months of the year is sure enough a good thing to be thankful for! The sunsets are fantastic.

Night Sky

I'm thankful for the stars at night. It could've been made that we wouldn't see them, but they're bright enough so we do. If you just take a moment to really think of it, it truly is amazing! And what about all the wickedly cool star constellations?

Nevermind that I can only find the Big Dipper (here we call it the Great Bear) and sometimes the lesser one too on my own, it's still pretty awesome to know there are so many more of them out there. Can any of you actually spot other canstellations up in the night sky? Do tell! I might just invite you to a star gazing party if I ever host one, ha!..

Change

Things change, people come and go... Easy to get frustrated and get angry with a change. But life happens, people come and teach you things, and they change you. And it's important to change. One just needs to make sure they don't lose their identity while at it, because with identity comes purpose - take it away and there's nothing purposeful left. But it's important to change, and I believe it's important to embrace any given change and be thankful for it.

Childhood Memories

When I was little my family had a dacha in Belarus, where me, my then non-working mom, my brother and my grandparents used to spend all summers long (my father would visit us whenever he could get away from work and make his way to basically another country). Our piece of land there was prosperous and the soils were rich - all sorts of nature's creatures lived and growed there in abundance. Nearby we had ponds with water lillies and frogs, and we had woods with numerous kinds of trees and all sorts of wild forest berries and mushrooms waiting to be picked up, and wild forest animals waiting to be discovered or maybe even hunted down... On our own lot we had various juicy fruits and garden berries that we would eat right from the trees and bushes, we had luscious flowers of all colors growing there too - I even had a beautiful pink rose planted in my name (my brother had a little oak tree planted for him). So many living things were there for us to enjoy also, I remember my favorites were friendly little grass snakes, the harmless kind with bright yellow spots on their heads - I was always fascinated with them and would touch and gently poke them on the head with my fingers, and they wouldn't mind that at all!

It all sounds just like a fairytale, doesn't it? Most of my childhood memories have to do with this amazing place, and maybe its wonderfullness is what deserves all the credit for making me remember myself and my surroundings so well since I was about 3 years old.

This is what I'm thankful for.

Summer 2010

I am thankful for this summer, which might as well be the most eventful and meaningful summer out of all the summers I spent not traveling. I had this mini goal to make this summer a mini pursuit of many things active and out of the norm – to do things I don’t usually do in Moscow and do things that can only be done when it’s hot outside, and looking back I am happy to realize I’ve accomplished enough (and the things I planned to do but didn’t get a chance to execute, I'll just keep in mind for summer 2011!)