Still Thankful

By Gary Silverman, CFP®

By this time next week, you might be done with Thanksgiving leftovers, but I hope you will not be done with Thanksgiving. While this has been a hard year for most, and a strange year for all, it is still a year to give thanks for. Each of us has heard, “It can’t get any worse than this,” and now most of us can testify that yes, it can. So as a minimum you can be thankful for a year that wasn’t as bad as it could be.
Let us not make light of what for many was a year of financial catastrophe, dream crushing, pain, and too-early a goodbye to loved ones. Still, you can look around and see people for whom this year was truly a struggle, yet they find things to smile about. Take away their wealth and they are thankful for their health; take away their health and they are thankful for their life; take away their life and those left behind are thankful for the memories.
This is not an easy thing. Life can get hard. Life can truly be miserable. But thanks can still be given. Thanks to our God. Thanks for our family. Thanks for our friends. Thanks for ourselves (you are allowed to love yourself, after all). 
I am thankful for my wife who loves and supports me. I’m thankful for the cherished friends we were not able to share a Thanksgiving meal with for the first time in I don’t know how long. I’m thankful for my friend who lives many miles away and whom I get to see maybe once every couple years but whom I know loves me. My buddy from elementary school days and his wife, both with complicating conditions, made it through a bout with the virus—I am thankful. Many friends and acquaintances made it through tough economic times and emerged whole on the other side. Even though the scars will last, their spirits are refreshed.
I am thankful for the abilities God has given me, the trust of our clients, and the efforts of my fellow-workers in giving prosperity to our business. Thanks to you for reading my words each week and to the Times Record News who trusts me to write them. Special thanks to Deanna: may you continue your success in your new endeavor. 
It is my hope that as you read this, I am progressing through the Route 66 Marathon. Though I am not running it in Tulsa this year due to the live event being COVID-cancelled, I am thankful for the runners who will be joining me today in supporting my effort as I support theirs. As I am writing this the weather looks to be a bit wet and very windy. So, while I may not be all that thankful for the weather, I know it could be worse, and I plan on being thankful for the bragging rights of getting through it.
In this time of Thanksgiving, what and who are you thankful for? I pray you will have ease in turning from your troubles and be able to acknowledge the blessings you have.

Gary Silverman, CFP® is the founder of Personal Money Planning, LLC, a Wichita Falls retirement planning and investment management firm and author of Real World Investing. This article was originally published in Times Record News.