Sometimes you have seen gratitude as an embarrassingly humble position, an emotional outbreak where you happily and luckily have received an undeserved bounty, as if you were not deserving, that somehow a great gift fell on you, and in the same breath as your gratitude, you entreat. On your knees, you ask for more of the same. Sort of a double-handed gratitude. "Thanks and keep giving to me, unworthy as I am."

A few crumbs are given to you, and like a pigeon, you run to get them. The difference between a pigeon and you is that the pigeon knows it is his right to receive those crumbs. He knows they are his due.

When sense of gratitude overwhelms you, you are like a slave of old who had no choice but to slather gratitude for even so little as not being beaten.

Do not demean yourself in gratitude to any man. Say, "Thank you. I appreciate this." And keep standing. And I, a loving God, do not ask you to cower in gratitude. Certainly, all gifts you receive in the universe come from Me. But here's the thing: No matter how great your rewards, you merit everything. That is the platform to start out from — that you deserve to win the election. You deserve all the votes. I suggest that you deserve to stand erect with all men for all things.

When you know you are worthy, how much unseemly gratitude would you deem to feel or feel obliged to display?

Why would you be so grateful for a drop of love when you are meant for love and love alone? If you knew this, really knew this, you would not inflate your gratitude. Instead you would institute love. You would stand on a step higher than gratitude.

If you are grateful for your blessings in life, then go out and bestow My blessings on others who do not yet know how blessed they are. Come from such a high place of worth that you can share your sense of worth with others. Bestow worth right and left as if worth were apple blossoms falling from a tree. The blossoms fall where they may, now creating a different beauty on the ground.

Because of your deservingness and therefore strength, you strew love. When you surpass gratitude, you get on with it. Gratitude is a great pause. It is admirable to recognize all that you have to be grateful for, yet it is more admirable to move with the same grace that has been given to you.

Gratitude, as expressed in the world, is often drama. You are beyond drama now. You are a subtler actor now. You do not emote gushing lines or use exaggerated gestures the way you used to. Through simple action and expression, you reveal more, and you touch hearts more, and more hearts. You are the confident actor who strides across the stage. You open windows, you open doors, you greet all who enter, and by your very presence, all others become more confident of their abilities and deservingness too.

The hungry get up off their knees. No longer is there supplication. There is no need for it, for those who have gratitude in their hearts give generously so that all may rise above gratitude.

In the overt world, there are two sides to everything. Gratitude, like everything else, is not all you have thought it was. It is more and it is less.