It is tempting to be grateful for all the good things in your life. When life is going well, the projects are being completed, you are ahead of schedule, your kids are happy, and you’re living the life that you want, there is an easy list of so many things that are good.

But what if all that was taken away? What if there were deep and dark times? What is there to be grateful for?

Gratitude is not just a list of things that you like in your life. Gratitude can be a way of appreciating your very existence.

Are you grateful to breathe?

Are you grateful that you can think?

Are you grateful for your Savior, Jesus Christ?

Are you grateful for your experience of life?

If you are only grateful for the good things in life, you might find yourself unprepared, not resilient, easily fractured when those good things go away.

But if you can foster gratitude for your existence, for those things that will never leave you, then gratitude can become part of who you are, a strength when everything else goes dark.