The Thankful Heart

Book excerpt: We all know that an attitude of gratitude helps each day be a little better. When times are difficult and challenges abound, having a thankful heart is the catalyst for the abundant life. The Thankful Heart, by well known family authors Richard and Linda Eyre, is a book to keep or a book to give, filled with messages of gratitude and inspiring images for even the most difficult day. In this beautifully illustrated book, we find the opportunity to consciously and deliberately develop our own skill to feel gratitude more deeply, and give it more freely. And we are challenged to turn the passive holiday noun “Thanksgiving” into the active, year-long verb “Thanks-Giving.” New York Times #1 bestselling authors Richard and Linda Eyre like to think of each November-December Holiday Season as another chapter in their exploration of Thanks-Giving. Early in their marriage, tired of the commercialism and conformity of Christmas cards, they began sending out a Thanksgiving Poem each year to friends and family. As the years rolled by, their life was increasingly defined by those three words—Family, Friends, and Thanks-giving. Through their poetry and the photos taken by family members, we go with the Eyres on their journey through various phases and perspectives of the transforming emotion of gratitude, and in the book’s final section, they share each of their Thanksgiving cards from the last forty-three years.