You are most likely receiving this newsletter on Thanksgiving Day. Thanksgiving, at least for Americans, is a time in which we give thanks for all of the blessings and gifts in our lives. I love Thanksgiving, but it may be more for the food than the forced gratitude day. Call me a Thanksgiving Scrooge, but sometimes the push for gratitude feels oppressive and I often feel guilty for not having some enlightened gratitude awareness. I am so grateful for many things in my life, yet the trendy push for gratitude can be overwhelming.
Not all of us are Zen enough to be grateful for some of the crap that comes our way.
“Be grateful for your cancer diagnosis!” “Be grateful for all the funerals you attended this year.” “Be grateful for losing your job.” Well, you get the idea. Not all of us are Zen enough to be grateful for some of the crap that comes our way and I’m not sure that we always need to be. On the other hand, I have seen how much my own mood and mindset can shift when I look and find things to be grateful for. My gratitude might look a tad bit less intense than other versions, but it really works for me.
Every day I write down three things that I’m grateful for, but they can’t be the same three things every day. And although I am grateful daily for my three children, my husband, and my dog (not always in that order), I look for three unique things to be grateful for each day. Coffee hits my list regularly, but I won’t allow myself to put it on my list every day. That’s just too easy. Chocolate has hit the list a few key times as well.
Here are a few other examples of my gratitude without guilt list:
- A sunny day
- A working car
- Work
- Clients
- A cat nap (taken with above mentioned dog)
- Not yelling at anyone
- Catching an earlier train
- Not honking my horn for a whole day
- Short meetings
- My favorite song on the radio
- An empty house (except for me and above mentioned dog)
- A hot shower
- Carry out
- Pizza delivery
- A weekend with nothing scheduled
- My laptop
- A great book and time to read it
- My hammock and time to lay in it
- Slow cookers
- When my kids show signs of being really good people
- A walk with my dog
- A great book on tape (I know, they aren’t really on tape anymore.)
- A new episode of The Big Bang Theory
Here’s the bottom line; Not all of us are grateful all the time and for all things. That seems pretty normal to me. Yet the feeling and mindset of gratitude is a powerful one that can bring us great joy and contentment. So what are some simple, even silly things that you can be grateful for? When you think of them, do you have a slight shift in your mood or your emotional energy level? If so, yes!, That’s the idea! If you are reading this on Thanksgiving Day (or even for about seven days afterwards), how grateful are you for stuffing and mashed potatoes?
Happy Thanksgiving, dear reader. I am truly grateful for all of you. Your comments and sweet notes back to me make me more joyful than I have thought possible. You all remind me of what is so wonderful about our world and for that I am both extraordinarily blessed and eternally grateful.
Love,
Lisa Kaplin Psy. D. PCC