Four days ago it was Thanksgiving here in the USA. One of the best traditions (aside from eating copious amounts of food) is to go around the table and say one thing that you're grateful for. There's actually been quite a bit of science about gratitude and how important it is to your overall happiness. One of my favorite researchers in this area is Brene Brown. She has some amazing TED Talks and this great clip about how important it is to be grateful.

She talks about how it isn't joy that makes us grateful but gratitude that brings us joy. So to be as joyful as I can be I'm going to list several things that I'm so grateful for working on the web. These aren't in any particular order just how they come up naturally in my head.

• Working Remotely. I'm so happy that I can work remotely and spend additional time with family and friends. Somedays I work late, somedays I work early, but I'm trusted to get the job done, and so I can do it when I want.
• Being Trusted. It's so important to be trusted in your organization. There are some days where you don't get all of the things you want done but my boss trusts me and know that I'm doing my best. He also knows that for everyday where I don't get as much done there are days where I get twice as much done.
• Working with a talented team. I am so grateful to work with a talented team. Being able to bounce ideas back and forth with these team mates all day long is just fantastic.
• GitHub. A couple years ago GitHub became the tool of choice for most open source projects and the incredible interface makes it so easy to submit patches. I love being able to work with a variety of tools and modify them when I need and then submit my patches to the developer so the changes get included in the next release. In fact on this very site I've submitted patches to both my theme (Highwind) and the form plugin (Ninja Forms).
• JFDI. One of the best parts about the web is the lack of red tape if you want to do something you just do it! If you think you can make an existing idea better you improve it. If you have an idea to make something you just build it. And if you can make something with value people will use it – no need for credentials.
• Feedback. One of the things my boss is great at is giving feedback. So far my feedback has been really great but it would still be useful if it was negative because then I have a chance to improve rather than get progressively worse. Good feedback is just one small part of…
• Good Communication. I can't express how amazing good communication can be. I honestly believe good communication can solve any problem. On our team we use a variety of communication tools that cater to certain needs. Having a Trello board for the status of our products, p2 for company wide messages, and HipChat with a variety of rooms for different needs.

These are just a few of the things I'm grateful for. Since this is the second post of the Blogging for Benjamin competition I plan on expanding on these over the coming month.