I really appreciated a scene from the book I just finished.

A King threw a party for his nobles and friends.  He wanted to celebrate the birth of a child to friends of his.  All the nobles and officials came to the party but were  rude and suspicious as to the reason for the party. (Was the king using the opportunity to announce a raise in taxes?)   Because of all this, they could not truly enjoy themselves.

The king’s friend and bard stood up and addressed those gathered in the hall:

“Have you become so numb to goodness , so cold to joy that you no longer recognize it when you see it?  Have your eyes become so blind and your ears so stopped to the gladness around you?….Have you forgotten the births of your own sons and daughters so that you cannot remember the way your hearts beat for happiness?  Have you never gathered kinsmen and friends to your hearth to raise your voices in song for the pleasure of singing?  Do each of you now live in such misery that you must deny the sound of laughter?  Are you grown so hard that the touch of a friend’s hand upon your shoulder is nothing more that n the touch of wind upon stone?”  Taliesin, pg. 430

It can be so easy to be swallowed up in grief and pain that we lose sight of all the joys we have experienced.  All the blessings we have received.  The bard here teaches us to reflect on those times of happiness and joy in life so that we do not forget how to celebrate, how to enjoy life-even in hard times.  The Psalmists often have the same approach.

See Psalm 77:10-20 for one example.  We look back and remember the ways that God has blessed us and intervened in the past, so that we might not become discouraged in the present.