And I thank you life

I was talking to a friend yesterday who is losing her grandmother and it caused me to think about how fragile our lives are with no guarantees and how thankful I am to have such a fortunate life. I was born into a silver spoon live with loving parents, family and family friends to support me. My parents worked hard and were modestly successful. My mother was able to be a stay at home mother and care for us each and every day. For the most part we avoided major sickness or crisis. I grew up being confident as a result of a loving family – not fearing what the world had in store for me. I avoided the major mistakes as I grew up. I was able to venture off of the reservation knowing where the boundaries were and where not to go. I watched some of my high school friends make poor choices and over time we went our own separate ways. I was able to survive high school, enjoy junior college and get serious about my life in college. I did not attend an Ivy League college but that did not get in my way in learning how to learn. I was able to right my life direction in a positive way and enjoy my work. And I thank you…
I met some great people along the way that really shaped my future. I found a spiritual teacher that opened my awareness to work on myself. I had other great influencers in high school who stamped me with their values and helped make me the man that I grew up to be. And best of all I dated some terrific women who forced me to mature and be responsible. I was fortunate to listen and learn along the way of the best of the best wisdom that was shared with me. I was also able to see some of my largest weaknesses and humbly try to improve myself. I loved hard - enjoyed and remorse in the lessons that having a relationship brought to me – all shaping and molding me into a well traveled person. And I thank you…
In my professional career I was able to balance my personal and professional parts of my life – I made that my highest priority. It did not yield me the potential success professionally that I could have reached, but at night I slept better than most. I also benefited in my career in seeing a large part of the world. My work brought me to many parts of Asia and Europe. It opened my eye to how ridiculously spoiled the U.S. lifestyle is. I would return home and marvel at the disproportional amount of resources that I had. My lifestyle in some parts of the world reflect a lifestyle of a King – big house filled with food, fancy cars, many pets, limitless in many abilities to comfortably life way beyond my means. And I thank you…
Last and most importantly I have an incredible wife and kids. They all are blessed with good health, attractiveness, and plenty of smarts. One could not ask for more, yet there are times when the anger, greed and folly get the best of me. I have met and learned that temptation is far stronger than my will so I try not to invite this demon into my life too often because I know the outcome. All in all the point of this brief note is to say thank you life for so many riches. And I thank you…