Well I say it all the time (in my class not on this blog)... Pride is the father of all sin. Humility is the cure for pride and it is a funny thing humility - because once you think you have it you've lost it.
The act of sincere thanksgiving is one we should practice often. This time of year, especially in these hardships most face, it is important that we remember the purpose of the holidays before us. First off we have Thanksgiving. Associated with gorging ourselves... All well and good but lets actually use this time of year to be thankful.
Christmas is about the birth of the Savior and all that it implies for our salvation and exaltation. We celebrate the miracle of Christ. As we struggle with the usual barrage of gift giving in economic hardships let us realize that we are being humbled and return to worship our Lord this season and not the merchant.
The New Year is a time of renewal and rebirth. Let us prayerfully make goals that we can realistically keep and write them down. Life is beautiful and miraculous.
Albert Einstein said it well, "There are two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle."
Regarding Thanksgiving I want to quote Abraham Lincoln and his Thanksgiving Day Proclamation:
"No human counsel hath devised, nor hath any mortal hand worked out these great things. They are the gracious gifts of the most high God, who while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. … I do, therefore, invite my fellow citizens … to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father, who dwelleth in the heavens. And I recommend to them that, while offering up the ascriptions justly due to him for such singular deliverances and blessings, they do also, with humble penitence for our national perverseness and disobedience, commend to his tender care all those who have become widows, orphans, mourners or sufferers in the lamentable civil strife in which we are unavoidably engaged and fervently implore the interposition of the almighty hand to heal the wounds of the nation and to restore it, as soon as may be consistent with the divine purposes, to the full enjoyment of peace, harmony, tranquility and union."
Many men have failed, governments have failed, businesses and creditors have failed. The Lord warned us about relying on the arm of flesh. We must return to the Lord humbly and gratefully.
Regarding our great country. We take for granted the sacred duty we have to elect and promote better leaders. "In a Democracy, the people get the government they deserve" - Alexis de Tocqueville