Choosing gratitude when everything feels like Armageddon

I've been feeling the pressure of media lately--social and otherwise. I feel like every time I log onto Facebook I'm overwhelmed by the personal grief that everyone is going through. And then there's all this stuff with the hurricanes and earthquakes and everything is just feeling very Armageddon-ish to me lately.

It's so easy to feel abandoned by God. All it takes is one heartache, one tragedy, one natural disaster. And then suddenly it's hard to remember about the sun that rises and sets every day, keeping us warm and alive on this glorious planet we've been given.

But honestly, how can we think of the rainbows when we're being pelted by hurricanes?

I think things must have been much easier (in some ways) back when information wasn't so instant. When the whole world wasn't resting on our shoulders. I feel so much responsibility and guilt about trying to help everyone and fix everything. There is always something I can be doing, someone I can be helping, some political injustice I should be fighting for.

And it's all just very overwhelming. But then the other day on one of our long commutes to my kids new school we were listening to the Book of Mormon in Nephi, where Lamen and Lemuel were murmuring because their father made them leave their home and their riches and go wandering through the wilderness (etc... etc...) and Nephi is like "Dude! Why are you complaining? Have you forgotten that you saw an angel?"

And in that moment I was like . . . oh yeah . . . maybe I have been feeling a little like Lamen and Lemuel lately because, seriously guys . . .
Life is hard!
And truly unfair!
And just impossible to understand!

But I had been forgetting about the (figurative) "angels" that I have seen. And about how God blesses us every day and gives us things like mountains and puppies and . . . tomatoes (tomatoes are severely underappreciated, especially by my children.)

So anyways I've decided my life is in need of a serious boost of gratitude. I need to stop focusing on the tragedies and start noticing all the blessings.

What do you do to feel gratitude? Maybe a gratitude journal? Meditating? I need your ideas!