There is no time like Thanksgiving weekend to focus on developing a gratitude practice to sustain you throughout the year. Gratitude is not meant to be reserved only for the holidays, but rather is a discipline that has been shown to have a myriad of benefits ranging from the physical to the psychological. When the bellies have been filled, the leftovers put away, the dishes done, how do we keep the spirit of the holiday alive in the days, weeks, and months to follow?
Why is everyone talking about gratitude these days? Isn’t it a little over-exposed?
The idea of gratitude, or the attitude of being thankful, is easily tossed about in everyday conversation and has been co-opted by plenty of businesses in designing home decor and personal fashion. It may be easy to dismiss “gratitude” as a passing fad, but in reality, establishing a regular gratitude practice in your everyday life is an easy way to level up your interactions with the world around you and your quality of life in general.
Believe it or not, people have researched the effects of gratitude and have found that the benefits of cultivating gratitude regularly in your life can lead to…
- More joy: who doesn’t want to feel lighter and happier on the inside?
- Emotional regulation: tired of those extreme ups and downs?
- Better sleep: good sleep is the key to optimizing so many brain and body functions
- Boosted immunity and decreased risk of disease: who likes being sick?
- Improve blood pressure: better blood flow will make you feel good all over.
- Reduced anxiety: too much anxiety can cause plenty of other issues. While we can’t completely eliminate all of life’s anxieties, managing them with gratitude can make a huge impact on your mental health
- Increased resilience: When you practice gratitude, you will be able to bounce back more quickly and easily from all sorts of setbacks instead of sitting in a swamp of self-pity.
- Improved physical health: including less aches and pains and more energy.
- Enhanced self-esteem: When you start to appreciate people and things around you, it becomes easier to appreciate all of the many positive things about yourself.
How do you establish a gratitude practice? There are various ways to integrate gratitude into your daily life. The idea is to make it a natural habit, like brushing your teeth:
- Write “Thank you” notes, like by hand and put them in an envelope with a stamp and throw them in the mailbox. Not only will handwriting your gratitude reinforce the thankfulness in your own heart, but expressing it to someone else will increase their own joy. Who doesn’t like receiving a handwritten personal note in the mail? Texts and emails are wonderful in their own right, but next time you feel grateful for something or someone, try mailing them a short note to tell them what a difference they made
- Gratitude journaling: Sometimes the “things” that we are grateful for are not the direct result of someone else’s actions. Specifically, if you are feeling grateful for a sunny, cloudless day, you cannot write a note to someone thanking them for the weather, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t worth writing down! Journaling about those abstract things that you feel gratitude for is an effective way to reinforce the memory. Describe your gratitudes and go into detail about why you are grateful for them.
- Gratitude jar: While won’t get as verbose, the gratitude jar serves a similar purpose as the journal, but it can be a more direct visual representation of the various gratitudes you experience. Get a large glass jar and keep slips of paper and pen nearby. Every time you recognize a gratitude, write it down and throw it in the jar. You will start to see the accumulation of gratitudes pile up. Inevitably, you will have a harder day, at which time, you can grab a handful and relive some of your previous gratitudes and rekindle the fire of positivity.
- Gratitude Rock: Find a small rock that you can easily carry around in your purse or pocket, or set it on a surface that you frequently look at throughout your day. Whenever you see or touch the rock, take a pause and think about something you are grateful for in that moment, whether it is the blanket keeping you warm at your desk or the big account you just closed. At the end of the day, look at the rock and remember all the various gratitudes you stopped and paused for throughout the day.
- Verbalizing gratitude to others throughout your day: “Thank you” goes a long way in cultivating healthy relationships with others, whether they are work colleagues, customer service representatives, restaurant workers, family, or friends. Consider taking your simple “thank you” to the next level and specifically tell people what you appreciate about interacting with them.
- Meditation: Intentional quiet time, stillness, or prayer on a regular basis is an important component of giving your spirit space to find and reflect on gratitude. Whether it is 30 seconds or 30 minutes, a meditation practice of some sort is an important part of generating more gratitude in your life.
Have you found other practices to help cultivate gratitude?
Stumped about what to be grateful for? Consider various types of gratitude to prompt your thankfulness. In a short time, your gratitude will snowball. The more you are thankful, the more you will find to be thankful about:
- Past happenings
- Present happenings
- Deep gratitudes
- Specific things about specific people
- Abundance
- Things that fill you will awe
- Receiving something because of someone else’s generosity
- Having expectations exceeded
- Improvements: even small incremental changes
- Sounds you love
- Smells that make you smile
- Visually pleasing sights
- Delicious tastes
- Friends
- Teachers
- Family members
- Tools in your home that make your life easier
- Work and colleagues
Want to know what is at the heart of our gratitude here at F.C.Tucker Emge REALTORS®? YOU dear reader! You are why we do what we do and we are deeply grateful for you entrusting your home searches, sales, and transactions with us. Selling real estate is more about understanding people than knowing houses, and we feel so fortunate everytime a client calls to ask us a question or request help. Thank you for your business and thank you for your referrals. We couldn’t do what we do without you.
