"I wish I were Nicole Kidman," I heard a woman say recently. "Why?" I asked. "She is rich, beautiful and famous," she replied. "Why wouldn't I want to be her?"
How much of our lives have we spent wishing we were someone we are not? It's a common and very understandable fantasy. Yet, this kind of thinking represents a double mistake. First, wanting to be someone else is obviously seeking the impossible. More important, though, is that every time we wish we were someone else, we may be simultaneously degrading our own existence.
The "day after" certain holidays creates an interesting phenomenon. How personally happy do we feel the day after Christmas? How romantic do we feel the day after Valentine's Day? Today, how thankful do we feel in our first hours after Thanksgiving?
Perhaps, today is a day for us to express a kind of personal gratitude for the fact that we are who we are. The typical caregiver may not live as glamorously as Nicole Kidman. Yet, many caregivers may be living lives that are more meaningful in terms of the way they heal others.
We can wile away our lives wishing for the impossible – that we were someone else, that we lived someplace else, that we were younger, that we were healthier. Or we can practice gratitude for who we are and for the life that we have. And we can practice this gratitude not by comparing ourselves to those who are less fortunate, but simply by thanking God for our existence.
It's our life choice, isn't it?
-Rev. Erie Chapman
Journal of Sacred Work 
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