Thanksgiving 2022: Reconnecting With Friends and Family

We should be grateful on Thanksgiving 2022, and make time for those small acts of kindness that allow others to be grateful.

Thanksgiving 2022: Reconnecting With Friends and Family

Some thoughts on gratitude and reconnecting with friends and family.

Queen Elizabeth: We will meet again

“We will be with our friends again, we will be with our families again, we will meet again”.
Queen Elizabeth

This quote was part of her Covid address but took on additional meaning after her funeral.

Steve Jobs on Giving Thanks

“I grow little of the food I eat, and of the little I do grow I did not breed or perfect the seeds.
I do not make any of my own clothing.
I speak a language I did not invent or refine.
I did not discover the mathematics I use.
I am protected by freedoms and laws I did not conceive of or legislate, and do not enforce or adjudicate.
I am moved by music I did not create myself.
When I needed medical attention, I was helpless to help myself survive.
I did not invent the transistor, the microprocessor, object oriented programming, or most of the technology I work with.
I love and admire my species, living and dead, and am totally dependent on them for my life and well being.”
Steve Jobs in an Email himself on  Thursday, September 2, 2010 at 11:08PM

I found this moving and representative of a mature Steve Jobs. Originally diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2003 Jobs had a liver transplant in 2009. I suspect when he wrote this he either knew or suspected that his cancer had returned. He passed away 13 months after writing this on October 5, 2011.

Life is Not a Zero Sum Game

“In my working life I have found no greater satisfaction than achieving success through honest dealing and strict adherence to the view that, for you to gain, those you deal with should gain as well. Human relations–be they personal or professional–should not be zero sum games.

And beyond the personal sense of satisfaction, having a reputation for fair dealing is a profoundly practical virtue. We call it ‘good will’ in business and add it to our balance sheets.”

Alan Greenspan at Harvard University Commencement address June 10, 1999

There are many outcome from a deal: there is the transaction itself, there is the business relationship you have an opportunity to establish or deepen, and there is a broader reputation for fair dealing that makes future deals with others easier. It’s easy to put numbers on direct quid pro quo of a deal itself, but while the social capital is harder to measure analytically  it’s no less important.

Random Acts of Kindness

Thanksgiving 2022: One Random Act of KindnessA Japanese Proverb advises that “One kind word can warm three winter months.” At a minimum you can put them in a good mood for the rest of the day.

“This man beside us also has a hard fight with an unfavoring world, with strong temptations, with doubts and fears, with wounds of the past which have skinned over, but which smart when they are touched. It is a fact, however surprising. And when this occurs to us we are moved to deal kindly with him, to bid him be of good cheer, to let him understand that we are also fighting a battle; we are bound not to irritate him, nor press hardly upon him nor help his lower self. We must feel as a brother toward the man beside us, and say to him the things that we should like to have said to us, and treat him as we should desire to be treated when are hands are hanging down and our hearts are heavy. And this is the very essence of courtesy.”
John Watson in “Courtesy” from “The Homely Virtues” (1903) [Google Books]

I hope your Thanksgiving allowed you to reconnect with friends and family and left you in a good mood for at least the next few days.

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Image Credit: Never underestimate the power of a simple gesture” by Harsh Darji (@harshdarji_4)) | Medium | Substack

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