S5 Ep4: The Incredible, Amazing Power of Gratitude
Gratitude is essential to our health, wellness, and wellbeing
Gratitude is never a bad thing. It is a matter of positivity and it always builds and never destroys. Saying thank you, and meaning it, expressing the feeling behind gratitude is a tool for change. When we express how grateful we are for things we have, things we receive, tangibles or intangibles, we empower ourselves, as well as those around us.
Gratitude in this way also improves our health, wellness, and wellbeing. On every level, gratitude is important to mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health, wellness, and wellbeing.
In the face of institutionalized disempowerment and disenfranchisement, we need every tool we can get to fix this.
Gratitude is not selfish
Not to put too fine a point on it, but feeling grateful and expressing gratitude is not an act of selfishness.
How can I express gratitude when so many people are suffering so horridly? Because feeling grateful for things in no way disempowers anyone else. All those people who are experiencing awful things and suffering do not have their lot in life made worse when you are thankful for things.
I know how hard this is. But consciousness creates reality. When we get focused on all this awfulness around us, we discuss it, we rant about it, we feel terrible seeing it, then we inadvertently energize it more. Being grateful and expressing gratitude is positive.
Tangible or intangible, big or small, gratitude is always empowering
There is no such thing as negative gratitude. Sure, there’s false gratitude, but that’s not gratitude. Genuine, true, real gratitude is always positive.
Genuine gratitude is an expression of appreciation. Appreciation is a direct pathway to kindness, compassion, and empathy. Everyone, everywhere, desires kindness, compassion, and empathy. Saying thank you, giving thanks, and offering gratitude are all positive, empowering acts. What’s more, they are just as powerful when given as when received.
Gratitude is abundance
Saying thank you, and FEELING thankful is empowering. When you receive genuine thanks, doesn’t it make you feel good? Giving it is equally – if not more powerful than - receiving it. The number of things for which we can be grateful are infinite.
Mindfulness and gratitude
How can you recognize and apply genuine gratitude? By using mindfulness.
This form of mindfulness is active conscious awareness. It’s not recognizing the world without via your six senses, though that is a factor. It’s more about knowing your inner being. To do that requires active conscious awareness. This is a matter of recognizing, here and now, in the present, what you’re thinking, what and how you’re feeling, what your intent is, if your approach is one of positivity or negativity, and what your actions are or aren’t.
Tangible or intangible, big or small, gratitude is always empowering and always positive.
This week’s Applied Guidance for Mindfulness Tool:
In the now, say and feel Thank You at least a dozen times today. Whether to someone or something or to yourself, say it. When you say it, think it, feel it, and intend it.
In this way, you empower yourself to change your life for the better. Gratitude is an expression of appreciation. Because like attracts like, appreciation appreciates. In this way, not only do you empower your life for the better, you empower the world for the better.
To give this an extra boost, at the end of the day, before you go to bed, write out at least 5 things you are grateful for. Read what you write and put the energy into it to feel it.
This practice can be applied forever.
Blogs: titaniumdon.com and mjblehart.medium.com
Original cover art artist Fe Mahoney: https://www.etsy.com/shop/TaliasInspirations