Gratitude

How could I not talk about gratitude during this thanksgiving season. It is not always easy to feel grateful though -when you are suffering and I don't ever want to belittle your suffering with a trite statement like "you just need to be grateful". That is not my intention at all. The answer to all your woes is not just "cultivating an attitude of gratitude". Sayings like that in fact may turn many away. It is simply not that simple!!

That said...there are a multitude of studies out there that attest to the healing power of Gratitude and that it is key to happiness.  I remember taking a class a couple of years ago that went through all of the most recent studies on happiness. I was struck with the fact that all the studies proved things I have always known as common sense. But hey atleast now we have studies to show it --right:)

One of those things they found was that the people with the most gratitude were the happiest. They found that there was no correlation between how rich someone was and how happy they were. As long as peoples basic needs were met -material things were not a factor of happiness. There are billionaires who don't feel satisfied and poor people who feel they have everything they need. The tendency to feel grateful is a mental attitude that can be developed.

Many scientific studies, including research by renowned psychologists Robert Emmons http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/author/Robert_Emmons/  and Michael McCullough, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_McCullough_%28psychologist%29)  have found that people who consciously focus on gratitude experience greater emotional wellbeing and physical health than those who don’t. In comparison with control groups, those who cultivated a grateful outlook:

• Felt better about their lives as a whole
• Experienced greater levels of joy and happiness
• Felt optimistic about the future
• Got sick less often
• Exercised more regularly
• Had more energy, enthusiasm, determination, and focus
• Made greater progress toward achieving important personal goals
• Slept better and awoke feeling refreshed
•  Felt stronger during trying times
•  Enjoyed closer family ties
• Were more likely to help others and offer emotional support
• Experienced fewer symptoms of stress

Ways to become more grateful. http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/ten_ways_to_become_more_grateful1

1. Keep a Gratitude Journal. Establish a daily practice in which you remind yourself of the gifts, grace, benefits, and good things you enjoy. Setting aside time on a daily basis to recall moments of gratitude associated with ordinary events, your personal attributes, or valued people in your life gives you the potential to interweave a sustainable life theme of gratefulness.
2. Remember the Bad. To be grateful in your current state, it is helpful to remember the hard times that you once experienced. When you remember how difficult life used to be and how far you have come, you set up an explicit contrast in your mind, and this contrast is fertile ground for gratefulness.
3. Ask Yourself Three Questions. Utilize the meditation technique known as Naikan, which involves reflecting on three questions: “What have I received from __?”, “What have I given to __?”, and “What troubles and difficulty have I caused?”
4. Learn Prayers of Gratitude. In many spiritual traditions, prayers of gratitude are considered to be the most powerful form of prayer, because through these prayers people recognize the ultimate source of all they are and all they will ever be.

5. Come to Your Senses. Through our senses—the ability to touch, see, smell, taste, and hear—we gain an appreciation of what it means to be human and of what an incredible miracle it is to be alive. Seen through the lens of gratitude, the human body is not only a miraculous construction, but also a gift.
6. Use Visual Reminders. Because the two primary obstacles to gratefulness are forgetfulness and a lack of mindful awareness, visual reminders can serve as cues to trigger thoughts of gratitude. Often times, the best visual reminders are other people.
7. Make a Vow to Practice Gratitude. Research shows that making an oath to perform a behavior increases the likelihood that the action will be executed. Therefore, write your own gratitude vow, which could be as simple as “I vow to count my blessings each day,” and post it somewhere where you will be reminded of it every day.
8. Watch your Language. Grateful people have a particular linguistic style that uses the language of gifts, givers, blessings, blessed, fortune, fortunate, and abundance. In gratitude, you should not focus on how inherently good you are, but rather on the inherently good things that others have done on your behalf.
9. Go Through the Motions. If you go through grateful motions, the emotion of gratitude should be triggered. Grateful motions include smiling, saying thank you, and writing letters of gratitude.
10. Think Outside the Box. If you want to make the most out of opportunities to flex your gratitude muscles, you must creatively look for new situations and circumstances in which to feel grateful.

Now I want to make sure that you understand that I am not implying that being grateful is the SOLUTION to happiness. When there is trauma or mental illness -professional help is vital to healing.

I have had periods of depression in my life and when my parents said things like-"you have so much to be grateful for" -it just made me more depressed. I already knew how blessed I was and hearing things like that-just made me feel more guilty for being sad. I figured I must be selfish if I could have so many blessings and yet still be sad. It was not until later in life that I learned that that is one clear sign of depression -feeling sad even though life is going so good.

The other thing I heard over and over again was "where much is given much is required. Just forget yourself and serve other people." Those are things a depressed person does NOT need to hear.  My whole life was about serving other people- so I could forget about how bad I was feeilng and I can attest that although it is rewarding to help others --it did not cure depression!

That said -grattitude in addition to professional help can help you heal!! The list above is not a magic list --it may not work for you. Can you find ways to feel grateful. For me it is taking a moment to notice nature around me. I find great joy in feeling the sun on my face, hearing the wind, smelling cool crisp air. Find what works for you.