Are you grateful? That’s a big question. It is pronounced at this time of the year. You can be grateful for the big things like health, or even the little things like the comforts of your home. It’s not a science as much as it is an art, whereby you acknowledge certain things in your life.

Here are 2 benefits.

#1—It Creates An Energy Shift. The act of being grateful produces emotions that are positive. Our human tendency is to wait until we feel an emotion before we act on it. The truth is that the action produces the feeling. If I wait for the feeling before I act, I might never get around to it. Therefore if you find yourself emotionally down or depressed, or if you feel you are in transition and sense that things in your life aren’t going well, what should you do? The act of being grateful will begin to produce your desired feeling.

Acknowledging, even for a few minutes a day, the things you are grateful for—big or little—will shift your energy in profound ways. You will definitely feel better! You will also discover that this is incremental and builds on itself. The act of thanking precedes the emotional benefits.

Emotion = Energy + Motion

The word emotion, has as its root the word motion. It means to move. Start moving and the emotions will follow. The act of being grateful will produce the energy shift. And the more you do this, the more positive energy you will create.

Energy Flows Where Attention Goes

But there’s more!

#2— By Focusing On What Is Good, You Will Attract More Good. You reap what you sow. If you are grateful for your health, your job, your senses, your partner, your friends, you will reinforce the good that already exists. But you will also be laying the groundwork for more good.

What is good? What is working? Don’t take it for granted. Then let your acknowledgement turn into gratitude.

When you fill your cup with what is working, you create more capacity and insight into what you want to achieve. This takes an if only attitude and turns it into an as is gratitude.

So give it a whirl. There is no better time to start than this week. You’ll reap great benefits! The greatest benefits will come from within. So start practicing this art. You can practice it all day long. It will create such a positive shift in your outlook that you might even become addicted to it!

Here are some tips:

  • Spend a few moments each day thinking about all the things you are grateful for.
  • Start a gratitude journal, and list something each day.
  • Focus on gratitude in the present tense.

When you begin to feel anxious and start that emotional panic, it’s often because you are looking for gratification somewhere in the future. That’s when you remind yourself you are already grateful. We all fall prey to the hedonic treadmill that keeps us pursuing gratification. Ironically this kind of behavior never seems to get it.

The art of gratitude is simple, yet the benefits are deeply profound. So what are you grateful for right now? In the present? Think them out loud. Write them down. Tell someone. You will find the benefits start with happiness and over time will mutate into joy.

Thankfulness is the beginning of gratitude.

Gratitude is the completion of thankfulness

 

 So from us to you…

Have a happy Thanksgiving

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4 Responses
  1. Jeane Caveness

    Mick,

    Thank you for this beautiful article on gratitude. I will be quoting you when I speak to CSULB’s Associated Students Inc. Senate/Board of Directors next week.

    Happy Thanksgiving,

    Jeane Relleve Caveness, Ph.D.
    Assistant Dean of Students
    CSU Long Beach

  2. Mick Ukleja

    Thank You Jeane! You are impacting a lot of young adults, especially in their formative years when they are developing values that will stay with them their entire lives. And for that, I’m grateful!!
    Mick

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