Let me start this article with a warning: If you aren’t ready to improve your life and enjoy success and happiness then avoid practising gratitude and do not do the exercises I will be introducing you too. On the other hand, if you want to sleep better, be more likely to reach your goals, improve relationships, experience improved health and lower stress levels, enjoy more special moments, then make practising gratitude a daily thing from this moment forward, and carry it on for the rest of your life.
Seriously, practising gratitude helps people sleep better and it is associated with several health benefits, including a lower blood pressure, improved immune function, and more energy. It also helps to improve our marriages, friendships and relationships with family.
Gratitude is incredibly empowering and does significantly increase your overall health, happiness, and success.
The best news is it costs nothing, is easy to do, there’s nothing too stressful or difficult to learn, and you can do it anytime, yet it will super charge your life. It is the most powerful tool in anyone’s personal development armoury.
You’re not convinced? Well you need to be! So, my suggestion is try practising gratitude for 30 days. Do the exercises I will write about, and at the end of this short time period you will see the difference it will make to your life.
Are you ready to transform your life?
No matter who you are, no matter where you are, no matter what your current circumstances, practising gratitude is going to change your entire life!
Gratitude is regarded as either a trait or state.
As a trait an individual practices gratitude as part of their daily life – they make time for gratitude.
Gratitude as a state is a character strength – they are more often than not grateful.
The Merriam-Webster Dictionary, defines gratitude as simply “the state of being grateful.’
Robert Emmons, a leading researcher on gratitude in psychology says that gratitude:
“has been conceptualized as an emotion, a virtue, a moral sentiment, a motive, a coping response, a skill, and an attitude. It is all of these and more. Minimally, gratitude is an emotional response to a gift. It is the appreciation felt after one has been the beneficiary of an altruistic act” (Emmons & Crumpler, 2000).
Like any skill worth having, practising gratitude requires time. Any good habit takes time to bed in. I have already in this article suggested you stick with it for the next 30 days. After that it will become automatic, and life will already be shifting into a far better place.
What have I got to be grateful for may be your initial reaction. After all many of you aren’t truly living but merely surviving from day to day and from pay check to pay check, fighting the onslaught of constant problems. Well here is the good news, practising gratitude each day you will see your life improving in every way. Relationships, work, and health, and instead of facing daily obstacles, your days becoming filled with one good thing after another.
The best way to reap the benefits of gratitude is to get started and use it everyday. So let me provide you with exactly what you need to do. What I am about to provide is 3 simple steps which will have an amazing impact on your life.
1. Practising Gratitude in the Morning
I want you to give thanks when you first open your eyes in the Morning – give thanks for the morning light, for your life and strength. Give thanks for your sleep and the joy of another day. Give thanks for the things you have, no matter how small they may be.
Ask yourself what are you truly blessed to have? For me I’d include my children, grandkids, my blogs, my business, my community, my improved health, my hair on my head, breath in my body etc. What are you happy and grateful for? With all your heart, what do you want to say thank you for? As you say each one, then say thank you.
2. Practising Gratitude during the day
Whether it’s a relationship in turmoil, financial pressure, a lack of health, or problems in a job, we all to often feel nothing but negative emotions. Well it is time to shift this. From now on you will deliberately look for things to be grateful for. You will look for the opportunity to be grateful. You are going to look for 10 things during the day to say thank you for. Whether it is someone for giving you a cup of coffee, or saying thank you for calling me. Maybe it is thank you for this great idea that has just come to mind, or thank you for the healthy tasty lunch you have eaten. Could it be simply thank you for being my friend, or thank you for working so hard in your job to a colleague. Who and what deserves your thank you today? Now start looking for things to be grateful for. Aim to say thank you ten times, note each time you do, and strive to reach ten thank you’s every day.
3. Practising Gratitude at Night
Before you go to sleep, while holding on to a treasured item I want you to give thanks for your day. With my father’s ring clenched in my hand, I give thanks for the events of the day as I lie in bed ready to close my eyes and drift of to sleep. Just before you go to sleep, pick up a treasured item, hold it in the palm of one hand, and close your fingers around it. Think back carefully through all the good things that happened during the day that you’re grateful for. Then say the words, thank you, after saying each good thing that has happened. Return the treasured item to its place by your bed. And that’s it!
“Cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously. And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in your gratitude.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
To have a great life, break the negativity that’s holding you back; give thanks, talk only about what you are grateful for, and let gratitude set you free!
Practising Gratitude will transform you. Say thank you. Say it out loud, whisper it to yourself, say it in your mind, or feel it in your heart!
Now apply it to your life.
“As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.” John F. Kennedy
If you have more negative things than positive things in your life, then something is very wrong and you know it. You no doubts will find it incredibly difficult to be grateful, to show gratitude, to feel as though there’s anything you have to be grateful for. Let me help you. Take me up on a FREE consultation session. I’ve been where you are, or at least somewhere similar. Book your free consultation session here.
photo credit: Network Osaka Target Thank You card via photopin (license)
