If you’ve spent a large portion of your life not focusing on gratitude, you can’t expect yourself to change your whole mind-set immediately. Most of us always try. Can you commit to adopting a grateful focus no matter what happens during the course of one single day? You’d be surprised how easy it is to do. Because being thankful for what you have is one of the simplest and easiest ways to lift your mood, to give your motivation a jolt and to live a happier life.
- Pause and look around yourself
A simple first step to being more thankful is to pause during your day and ask yourself these two questions:
- What are 3 things I can thankful for in my life today?
- Who are 3 people I can be thankful to have in my life and why?
If you don’t come up with 3 people and 3 things each day then that is OK. One thing or person is great too.
But if you can, try to not repeat yourself too often. Instead, think of more people and things to be grateful for to, day by day, expand your thankful view of your world.
2. Express your thankfulness
Don’t stop at just coming up with people for whom you are grateful to have in your life. Take a few seconds to tell them about it. This will make their lives happier. And as their faces light up with a smile you’ll feel happier too. Now, that gratitude could just be a small sentence. But it can have a big impact on someone’s day, week or even life sometimes.
So be sure to make the small effort to express it.
3. Look towards yourself
It is not only things that are important or other people. You are important and valuable too. So appreciate that.
Ask yourself:
What are 3 things I can be thankful for about myself?
It could be that you were a good sister during a crisis last week. It could be that you finally got done with that boring or difficult task you had been procrastinating on. Your self-gratitude does not have to be all about achievements. You can simply be thankful for your good sense of humor. Or the help you give your friends and family by being a good listener from time to time.
And the thankfulness doesn’t have to be about big things either.
4. Be thankful for things you may take for granted
The things we get very used to having can become things we take for granted. But they are not things everyone in the world has access to.
A few such things that I like to reflect upon and feel very thankful for having are:
- A roof over my head and a warm home.
- Plenty of drinkable water.
- That I don’t have to go hungry.
- Being able to enjoy the small and free pleasures of life.
- Access to the internet so that I can learn and connect with people.
I have found that being grateful for things like these are especially helpful to zoom out and to put my situation in perspective when I am going through a tough time in life.
5. Start and end your day with gratitude
To make thankfulness into a habit that sticks find a regular time for it in your day. For example, you can start your day in a good way by finding 3 things to be grateful for about yourself over breakfast. Or you can take a few minutes in the evening, just before going to bed, to use a journal to write down 3 things you are grateful for about your day.
Try a tiny time commitment like one of these and see what impact it has on your life.
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