Count Your Blessings

Recently, I learned a lesson about thankfulness that I won’t soon forget.

A couple weeks ago, my school hosted their annual housing lottery. Basically, every upperclassman that is planning on living in the on-campus apartments enters a lottery in hopes of getting an apartment assigned to them. Unfortunately, the campus does not have enough apartments for all the upperclassmen, and every year there are a select few students who get stuck with a dorm assignment. 

Needless to say, it IS a little nerve wracking when the lottery time comes. Students check their computers obsessively hoping to receive that blessed email that will inform them that they can leave the dorms behind for good. 

I had a feeling going into the lottery that my apartment wouldn’t get an assignment. I always have terrible luck with these types of things, and I was certain that this time wouldn’t be any different.

Sure enough, the 3^rd day of the 4-day lottery came to a close, and we STILL hadn’t received an apartment. “Why me?” I thought to myself. “They need to change this system. They should give preference to students who have never had housing violations.”

But then I logged onto Facebook, and I saw a message that my friend from Brazil had left me. He asked if I had been watching the news and then said that many students from his area of the country had been shot at a middle school that day. A former student had come into the school with a gun and started targeting kids at random. The policemen had no idea what the motive was, and the killer shot himself before they could ask him.

As I expressed my condolences to my friend, I realized the differences between my world and the world of those less fortunate. My biggest concern that day was getting an apartment. If I didn’t get one, I was still guaranteed clean, safe on-campus housing.

The biggest concern of families in Brazil that day was the senseless loss of their children. Suddenly the Housing Lottery seemed a lot less important.

I know that it is impossible to always keep things in a global perspective, but I would argue that it is important to one’s spiritual health to count your blessings. We have so much very blessed in this country, but we won't realize it unless we take the time to notice.