What the Hell is Thanksgiving All About?

(Faces will be stuffed come Thursday, be prepared to roll over and pass into comatose)

So I am sure that you are totally amped and ready for the coming turkey day in which people from all across the US will stuff their faces full of oh so delectable comfort food. Hell, even I on my 90% raw vegan diet fully plan on engorging myself and eating one massive meal on Thursday.  Earlier today while I was fantasizing about turkey and green beans swimming in a pool of mashed potatoes that will soon be my belly, I got to thinking what the hell Turkey day, Thanksgiving, or post hangover from the biggest drinking night of the year day is really all about.

So what the hell is thanksgiving anyway? According to my very reliable sources (my uncle and Wikipedia *cough*) Thanksgiving is described as, “Thanksgiving Day is a harvest festival. Traditionally, it is a time to give thanks for the harvest and express gratitude in general. It is a holiday celebrated primarily in Canada and the United States. While perhaps religious in origin, Thanksgiving is now primarily identified as a secular holiday.” So before I got back and amend my list of comatose turkey eaters to include our fellow Canadians, it has become apparent that thanksgiving is really just a great big excuse to get together and eat a lot of food. Now I love eating, so I am not complaining, but what why should we really care about giving thanks and expressing gratitude in general, especially around our families that many of you deem as less than ideal partners to spend with for a day? So I dug a little bit deeper into the wonderland of the internet and discovered a few better descriptions for the actual meaning of why we were thanking or being grateful for anything on this day, in hopes that we can all offer something other than a steady hand and a fork on this day of family togetherness.

I finally came across a far more noteworthy source, the History Channel. They have to be spot on, right? They describe Thanksgiving as, “The Plymouth colonists and Wampanoag Indians shared an autumn harvest feast which is acknowledged today as one of the first Thanksgiving celebrations in the colonies. This harvest meal has become a symbol of cooperation and interaction between English colonists and Native Americans. Although this feast is considered by many to the very first Thanksgiving celebration, it was actually in keeping with a long tradition of celebrating the harvest and giving thanks for a successful bounty of crops.”  So basically we are celebrating the unity that can be achieved by working together and acting on behalf of the greater good, instead of looking out solely for one’s self.  This is great shit, now we are on to something.

I find that we often can trap ourselves in looking out for ourselves about the needs of others, whether you are a self help junkie who is constantly learning new skills and ideas, or a fashionista who is obsessed with looking that much better in comparison to the person next to her. Now don’t get me wrong, trying to be your best and doing your best on the daily is one of the most positive things you can do with your life. But what if instead of taking that passion and energy and directing at yourself, you took time to direct to others who could benefit the most from your passion, love, and 4 cans of Redbull you had in the morning.  This is the essence of not only Thanksgiving day, but life in general.

Thanksgiving is meant to serve as a reminder that putting the needs of others above our own is one of the most powerful and important things we can do in our lives. Helping family, friends, and even strangers in the high and low points of their life is one of the most rewarding things you can do for them and yourself, and we spend thanksgiving to appreciate these ideals of unity, togetherness, and working for the benefits of all.

Now as much as this sounds like some TV special gone horribly wrong, you can’t help but recognize that putting others above you is something that we could all work to improve in our lives. So this Thanksgiving I challenge you to not only appreciate that friends, family, and love that you have in your life, but also to spread some of that joy onto people who may not be as fortunate as you are.

Whether you decide to donate your time to a soup kitchen or donating food to those who won’t be having a large feast this Thursday, or pay an organization a small fee that will better help them in supporting people from all around the world, you will be doing a service for everyone. Hell, you could even decide to not blow off those boy scouts that liter in front of your local grocery store and offer up a bag of your canned gods to them, you know as well as I that you have more than enough money to replace those goods the minute you step foot in that store for getting all the fixings you will be using this Thursday.

Spread the love around a bit, I promise it won’t hurt, it will feel kind of nice, and you will be that much more understanding of what you are thankful for when you go back for your third round of pumpkin pie.

Happy Thanksgiving

Gabriel