“Be thankful for what you have; you’ll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don’t have, you will never, ever have enough.” ~Oprah Winfrey
Dear Universe,
Last week I had the unbelievable opportunity to see Oprah (yes, Oprah!!!) speak and it was an unforgettable evening. She so generously shared her wisdom, her humor and her light and it’s not something I will forget. She is just as amazing in person as you think she would be. What an incredible human!
Because it feels important for me to document the evening somehow—it would be impossible to capture all of it—and because I want to share some of my takeaways from the evening with all of you, I decided to write about a few meaningful moments from the evening.
Here are some golden nuggets of wisdom that I took from her:
Nugget One: Live a life of gratitude and intention.
Oprah described both these things as her religion. Don’t do anything unless it aligns with your soul. Be aware of the intention behind your words and your actions.
Also, keeping a gratitude practice is life changing. She shared that she has a gratitude journal she writes in daily.
I agree with both of these nuggets! I’m so grateful that my life centers on both living with intention and a regular gratitude practice.
One way I regularly practice gratitude is at night my husband I share what we are feeling grateful for. My rule? We have to mix it up! When I feel we are repeating the same thing too many days in a row, I ask us to dig deeper.
I did this with my meditation class last week too. I had them write five things they were grateful for. When they were done, I had them write another five…then another five. The “harder” it becomes to write, means the more we have to deeply reflect on what we feel blessed for—and that’s what it’s all about!
Nugget Two: The most important question you can ask yourself is, “What do I want?”
If you are going around asking everyone else for an opinion or answer, the best thing you can do is sit in quiet and let the answer come.
I love this so much. If we are open, the answers always come to us. We just need to be willing to listen and trust. Oprah made the point that we may be surprised about how the answer comes and I could relate to that. I have had answers come to me in the way of license plates, road signs, dreams, strangers delivering a message, my intuition shouting at me… The point is, if you ask and you are open, they will come! You don’t need the answer from someone else.
Nugget Three: More than anything, people want to be heard.
Oprah shared that in her 25 years of hosting her talk show, she noticed that all the guests had something in common.
At the end of the show they would turn to her and ask, “Did I do okay?”
After several years of being asked this, she finally understood what they meant. What they were really asking was, “Did you hear me?” “Did my message come across?”
Oprah said she realized that’s all any of us want really—to be truly heard and to connect with one another. She even went so far as to say that every argument comes down to this central idea too—each person longing to be heard and to be seen.
Nugget Four: Every day you are on a mission.
Your mission is to be of service. Ask “How can I be used?” Again, an answer will come!
Oprah spoke about how our life purpose isn’t this one big thing. It’s all the little things we do that make a difference, make our purpose. It’s showing up for people when they need us. It’s being present and considerate. It’s the way we show love to others.
We are living our purpose already. There’s no need to search for it; just be intentional about it.
Nugget Five: God/Universe/ Source has a better, more incredible dream than you can imagine for yourself.
One of my favorite moments of the night was when Oprah shared this beautiful story:
When she was a little girl she grew up in poverty and one day she went to family friend’s house. She noticed they had nice cars in the driveway, grass in their yard and oak trees—all things her family didn’t have at the time. She looked at the trees and counted them. There were six. And she thought, “someday I will have a yard and it will have trees in it.” She said that was the moment she planted that seed in her heart and soul.
About fifteen years ago she was making tea in her kitchen and while she waited for it to brew, she looked out her window. Something made her pause—and it was that she noticed her trees. She remembered herself as a little girl counting the six trees so she went outside and started counting her own and she couldn’t. So she hired a tree counter! He counted and told her she had over 3,600 trees!
She was overcome with emotion. That moment reminded her that God often has a bigger dream for us than we have for ourselves.
I love this because I know it to be true. Something I often share in a meditation class is that when we ask the Universe for something there are three answers: “Yes,” “not now,” or “I have something better for you.”
Sometimes we receive a no or get rejected and think we are failing in some way, but I’ve found it’s usually the Universe’s way of directing us to something way better than we are imagining!
Nugget Six: Give what you can.
This wasn’t a specific lesson Oprah preached about, but rather it was a moment she led by example.
It’s no secret that Oprah appreciates teachers. I can remember shows of hers where the audience would be filled only with teachers and Oprah would be gifting them all sorts of goodies as a way to show her appreciation. She often spoke of her fourth grade teacher—and she did again this night.
She also asked that all the teachers in the audience stand. My best friend practically hoisted me up. Oprah stood too, looked at all the teachers and gave us a sincere thank you and applause. The whole arena cheered those of us standing. I looked around to take it in. There was A LOT of us.
I have to admit I felt really moved by this. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so much gratitude coming my way at once!
At the end of the evening, it was announced that $1.5 million dollars had been raised in scholarship money for students at UMass Lowell–where the talk was! Imagine. One night. $1.5 million dollars. That’s an incredible amount of money that will significantly impact six lives. The students who will receive the scholarship all came on stage and shook hands with Oprah.
As if this wasn’t moving enough, Oprah then announced—to the surprise of everyone—that she would like to match the donation. And just like that Oprah donated another $1.5 million dollars to help more students.
There was a stunned silence, than uproarious applause.
I was moved to tears. I wasn’t the only one.
She then gave a sincere, heartfelt thank you to all of us for being there so close to the holiday when we had so much to do.
Oprah, I think we could all put our to-do list on hold that night! You are Oprah! And let me tell you! Putting aside the to-dos, was certainly worth it!
I could go on and on about this amazing night, but I feel like these golden nuggets encompass beautiful truths that we can all benefit from with some time meditating or reflecting.
It also made me wonder: if you had to write down what your golden nuggets are that you live by, could you?
It might be a great thing to try this Thanksgiving! Why not give it a whirl?
Wishing you all a happy, peaceful and heart-full holiday!
With Gratitude,
