The whole concept of gratitude was one I used to roll my eyes at mightily.
I would see people do posts about their “30 days of gratitude” and I couldn’t help but be smug.
“Must be nice, to be all happy, and shit,” I’d say.
The truth was I didn’t think happiness was available to me. I didn’t think gratitude was available to me. I felt destined to be frustrated and unhappy my whole life.
I might have even heard phrases like, “What you focus on, you attract” but I wrote them off as platitudes. They seemed like ideas that somebody other than me could take advantage of.
The point that turned things around for me was after the 2016 election. Like many people, I was scared and disheartened about what had happened. I spent a lot of my time in a mild state of panic.
Not knowing what to do, I organized some friends together to talk about what we were experiencing.
We developed a set of questions to focus our conversations around. The questions were:
What are you grateful for?
What are you working on?
What do you worry about?
What gives you hope?
Each time it came my turn to talk, the first question always shifted my focus and changed my attitude. Before diving into a rant, I stopped to realize what was good in my life too. I had my health. I had wonderful friends. I was seeing people get motivated and bringing community together.
This gratitude didn’t negate what I was feeling or the real challenges some of us were facing. Far from it! It was actually empowering. It helped to realize what was important and what was worth fighting for. It opened my eyes to how good life could be and how it was in my power to make it even better.
Even when things felt low, it helped me gain perspective and understand what was wonderful about my life. And all it took was an extra moment to stop and consider it.
Do you have a gratitude practice in your life? How does it go? How does it help you?
If you’re curious to learn more about gratitude, I’m hosting a mini workshop this Thursday, Dec. 2, at 1 p.m. PST on the challenges, practices, and benefits of cultivating gratitude in our lives. I’d love for you to join! A link to sign up is right here.
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Storytelling is a fascinating aspect of how we perceive the world and exist as humans. If you’d like to learn more, download the Storytelling Primer below and start learning more about storytelling today.
For a long time I knew there was a different version of me that I wanted to be. That person would be more open, expressive, curious, and excited for life… but I didn’t know how to get there.