Articles about gratitude and Thanksgiving

A few words to share:

In our society today, "being grateful - remembering to be grateful - giving thanks"

The article below by an ordinary person about the enlightenment of "gratitude - gratitude - Thanksgiving" on Thanksgiving Day November 28, 2013 in the US, is so profound, I would like to sincerely

Only a few days left until Thanksgiving.

As a teacher in the Vietnamese Wing Chun Noi Gia Quyen dojo in both Vietnam and Poland, I would like to sincerely thank all those who have been and are currently my students.

I'm happy because everyone has been with me.

Warsaw November 25, 2013

Master Nguyen Ngoc Noi

Good : " With just a smile..."

(The author wrote on Thanksgiving Day November 28, 2013)

So another Thanksgiving season has come.
The first year I arrived in America, Thanksgiving had absolutely no meaning to me at all. I was just happy because that day was off from work, and I had an evening to gather and eat with my family.

At this time, I am interning at a Pharmacy to get my Pharmacist degree.

The pharmacy has a regular customer, her name is Josephine Smiley.

Every time she comes to get medicine (she takes more than a dozen each month, for all kinds of illnesses), I look at her with concern.

I still remember clearly the afternoon before Thanksgiving in 1993, when she came to pick up her medicine.

I opened the card and was moved to see the shaky, shaky handwriting:


Dear Thanh,
My name is Josephine Smiley, but life doesn't "smile" to me at all.
Thank you, very much, for your smile...

(Dear Thanh,
My name is Josephine Smiley, but life has no "smile" for me at all.
She is the one who always smiled at me, after the death of my husband and my son.
She makes me feel happy and keeps me going.
Thank you, very much, for your smile...)
Then she hugged me and she had tears in her eyes.
That was the first time I felt the noble meaning of Thanksgiving.

On Thanksgiving Day next year, I also expected her to come pick up the medicine before closing the store.

My dear Thanh,
I am thinking of you until the last minute of my life.
I miss you, and I miss your smile...
I love you, my "daughter"... .

(Dear Thanh,

I am thinking of you until the last minute of my life.
I remember her, and I remember her smile...
I love you, my "daughter"...)
I still remember crying my eyes out that day, unable to continue working, and crying throughout her funeral, the "American Mother" called me "my daughter"...
Before Thanksgiving the following year, I applied to work at another pharmacy, because I knew that my heart was too weak, and I would not be able to bear the great love I felt for her every holiday.
Until now, I still keep two cards from this patient.
Normally in America, Thanksgiving is an occasion for family gatherings.
Since a few weeks before Thanksgiving Day, almost every market is filled with turkeys, chickens, some alive, some ready-made meat... Every Thanksgiving season, there are hundreds of millions of chickens.
Vietnamese people often criticize turkey for being bland, so they often make chicken, "walking chicken."
For more than 10 years now, every year around Thanksgiving, I try to arrange my work so that I can participate in "Free meals" organized by Charity Associations, to help provide meals to homeless people.
Everywhere on this earth, there are always many people in need of our kindness...
If we talk about the words "THANK YOU" to people to whom we are indebted, our list will probably be very long, because no one exists in this world who has not been indebted to one or more people.
Thank you to my homeland - Vietnam, with its two rainy and sunny seasons, and its poor and hard-working people.
Thank you Mom, for giving birth to me and raising me until I grow up.
Thank you, Dad, for raising and educating me to be a good person.
Thank you, teachers, for teaching me to be a good person, for giving me so much knowledge so that I can become a useful person for the country and society...
Thank you, my sisters and brothers, for sharing with me the most difficult days, the first days of setting foot in a foreign land, for sharing my joy, for encouraging me in times of success, for supporting and supporting me.
Thank you to all my friends, for giving me so many memories - happy and sad - priceless gifts that I cannot afford.
Thank you to my old best friend, who "raised" me all these years in college, with "gigo" cans of rice, vegetable meals, egg meals, small cups of tea, or glasses of iced tea in the cafeteria every day.
Thank you, my patients, for giving me joy in my work.
Thank you, my bosses and mistresses, for letting me know the value of money, so that I understand that I should not waste it, because honest money must always be exchanged for hard work...
Thank you to the lovers, even the ones who left, for helping me know what love is, what happiness is, and what pain and separation feel like.
Thank you for the poems and music that have helped me find joy in the most carefree moments, to forget a little sadness and anxiety, to see that this life still has something to remember and love...
Thank you for the ups and downs of life, for allowing me to taste all the sweet and bitter flavors of life, to realize that this life is impermanent... so that from there I can gradually reduce the "I" - the ego.
Thank you to everyone... those who have come into my life, and even those I have never known.
"We haven't met a hundred years ago,
Will we see each other again after a hundred years?
The life of color and form is emptiness
Well, let's live wholeheartedly together..."
And so every year, when the Thanksgiving season comes, I go buy cards, or a little gift to give to my Mom, my sister, my loved ones, and those who have helped me.
In this life, sometimes we need to express our love with a specific action, even if it's just a word "I love you Mom", or a card or a rose branch.

Thank you life...


Hoang Thanh
(ie Vo Ngoc Thanh)