Gratitude and Desire: Two Sides of the Same Call

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Happy Pandemic Thanksgiving! I hope yours won’t be too hard this year, even though I’m guessing it won’t be the same as it was before. Everything feels different now, although one thing for me that’s new and positive has been a different way to think about gratitude. I won’t use the U-Word (unprecedented) because I’m sick of it, but I will say that I’ve never thought about gratitude in this way before.

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This new insight came from Brené Brown’s Dare to Lead podcast and an interview with Abby Wambach, the two-time gold medalist Olympic soccer player. In Wambach’s book on women’s leadership called Wolfpack, she names several “old rules” for women leaders and reframes them into new possibilities. So, for instance, she says the old rule was for women to simply be grateful for what they had, but that prevented them from reaching for more. The new rule is to be grateful but also ambitious. She writes, “Be grateful and brave; be grateful and righteous; be grateful and persistent; be grateful and loud. Be grateful for what you have and demand what you deserve.” In a world that continues to undervalue women in the workplace, this seems like good advice, but what about how it might apply to the spiritual life?

Spiritually speaking, gratitude and ambition work together in tandem. Although I could definitely stand to be grateful more often, forcing it implies that I should also be satisfied, and sometimes I’m not. Sometimes I’m grateful but also yearning for more – more love, justice, community – and thankfulness on its own can silence my desires. On the other hand, ambition without gratitude can easily move to greed, which is not a virtue. Gratitude paired with desire for more out of life, though, is definitely spiritual. Both desire and gratitude come from God, and God uses them together to speak to me.

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This is how I experienced God calling me to religious life. At the time, I wasn’t trying to discern a vocation, believe me. I didn’t just sit down one day and think, oh gosh, I’d better sort this out. Instead, I was wrestling through a confusing and beautiful time of spiritual growth and trying to understand the deep, restless yearning within me. I was grateful for God’s presence my life, but I was also unsatisfied. There was something in me that wanted more than minimal involvement in my faith. I wanted to make my relationship with God entirely central to my life, and when I started looking at religious life, I realized that if I moved in that direction, I could have a fulfilling spiritual life and a community of people who also wanted God at their center. As I think about it, this wasn’t an isolated instance. Every time I’ve changed ministries or moved or initiated a group or event, I was grateful but also driven. God was the still, small voice in my heart and the Spirit pushing on my back, moving me forward.

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This interplay of gratitude and striving is how people stay centered in God and also bring about change. Ignatius of Loyola desired more and instructed his followers to pay close attention to their desires. Jesuits call this striving for excellence magis, or more. I also think of the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr. God showed him the mountain top and pushed him to work for it. I think of Catherine of Sienna who wanted more for her church, Teresa of Avila who wanted more for her community, and Simone Campbell who wants more for our country. I think of a whole litany of Sisters and Associates in my community whose desire pushes them to minister to marginalized people and advocate for justice. I think of Jesus himself whose desire for the coming of the Kingdom burned so deeply within him that he cried out, “I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing!” (Lk 12:49). Each of these people was probably grateful, but each was also brave, righteous, persistent, and loud. They were grateful and unsatisfied. Their gratitude kept them rooted in God, and their dissatisfaction drove them to work for more.

Have you noticed this dynamic in your life? I think it’s pretty real during this pandemic. We can be grateful for what we have and want more. I’m grateful for the creative ways that I’ve been with my family, but I want to be able to have my nieces over for slumber parties and hug my parents and grandma again. I’m grateful to have communities, both my religious one and my God Space one, but I long to be together again in person. I’m grateful for the ways my neighborhood has come together, but I want more – more justice for people oppressed by racism, more abundance and an end to poverty, more peace and freedom for everyone.

Gratitude helps me to notice all that God has given me. It roots me in the present and helps me to recognize God‘s love for me and for all people. But my desire for more comes from God too. It’s in my desire that God calls me (and us) to dream big and to make the world better. If we stop at gratitude we stop working for change. So, we open ourselves to deep gratitude, praising God in joy and thanksgiving, and then we notice our deepest longings and act on them. Our desire for more fuels us on to bring about the kingdom of God.

For reflection:

  • For what are you grateful right now?

  • And what is the desire of your heart? What more do you want in your life, in your community and family, in the world?

By Sister Leslie Keener, CDP

Sister Leslie Keener, CDP is the director of God Space, a community-building spirituality ministry in Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky. She’s a Sister of Divine Providence with a Masters in Ministry and a Certificate in Spiritual Direction and Retreats from Creighton University. She directs retreats, meets with people for spiritual direction, and serves as the vocation director for her community. She also serves on the Coordinating Council of Spiritual Directors International. She enjoys music, dancing, and meaningful conversations.