Honesty Hour: Practicing Gratitude

The season of thankfulness & gratitude is upon us. And by upon us, I mean it’s here.

For a lot of people at this time of year, they are truly grateful and have no problem practicing gratitude. It’s just part of this season & this month as we celebrate Thanksgiving. I can see that this year may have been much harder to practice gratitude than normal. No one is going to argue that it’s been…rough. Thanksgiving celebrations may not look normal for you which may also be hampering your ability to be grateful. So, in honor of this being the season of gratitude & it possibly being more difficult than usual to be thankfulness, I wanted to write to you about it and take you on my journey of practicing it, why I think it’s important, and a little challenge for you.

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grate·​ful: appreciation of benefits received; expressing gratitude

I would be lying if I said that gratitude has always come easy to me. It hasn’t.

For a while, I struggled with people. It became a running joke that I hated people (you should laugh at this; I didn’t truly loathe people). You can chalk that up to the people I was surrounded by and the environment that I spent 8 hours a day in. I sure wasn’t feeling very thankful.

I eventually left that environment and became surrounded by much better people. And I started liking & believing in humanity. I became a little more positive and hated people a lot less. 🙂

Fast forward about four years…

I was looking to challenge myself a little more, in a lot of areas of my life. I decided to create a monthly calendar where I tracked various goals. There were a wide range of goals throughout the year with some continuing for the rest of the year & some just for a specific month. For example, I wanted to practice piano more so my goal was to practice 3 times a week for 15 minutes. One goal was to cook a new recipe once a week in April. (That one did not continue for the rest of the year. Haha)

I distinctly remember in February deciding that I wanted to start a gratitude journal. Why? I wish I could remember. I just remember looking at the cute pink & red calendar I made in Microsoft Publisher (my fav) for the month of love & deciding gratitude would be a good thing to work on that month.

Every single night, I would write down 3 things that I was grateful for from that day. Three things felt manageable but still effective enough and of course, if I had more, I was free to add more to the list. That was in 2018. This gratitude journal has stuck around and is still going strong today, 2.5 years later.

My Gratitude Routine

Every night, I write my three things I’m grateful for and then I write in my journal about whatever is on my mind/going on in my life. But the gratitude journal always comes first. It doesn’t necessarily change the tone of what’s being written in my journal afterwards but I like the ritual of writing what I’m grateful for (even when it’s hard) and then writing about whatever else I need to write about—good or bad.

I think it’s important to state here that those three things that I’m grateful for don’t always write themselves. There are many days where I have to sit & think about what happened that day and then what I am thankful for from it. Then there are also some rough days where everything seemed to be a dumpster fire & I’m like “1) Sweaters. 2) Sweet tea. 3) Bookmarks.” And I call it a day. (I’ve actually never written down bookmarks but honestly, yes, I’m grateful for those too. Haha) Some days are total gems and I can easily spout off 4-5 things instead of the usual 3. Every day is different & that’s totally okay.

Gratitude + Positivity

I think that a lot of times gratitude is confused with positivity. Those two things are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Studies have shown that gratitude can lead to positivity & can lead to you thinking and viewing things differently, in a better and more positive light.

But practicing gratitude doesn’t require you to be positive. It requires you to stop and think about the decent and good things happened that day. That’s it.

Positivity might be a side effect of gratitude but it isn’t a requirement. So don’t let the thinking that you’re not a positive person stop you from practicing gratitude.

The goal of keeping a gratitude list isn’t to have this magical life where writing those things come so easily and you don’t have to think about it. A gratitude list is great for those days & it’s great to look back on what you wrote on those days. I can read some of them & without looking at the date know what day that was.

The gratitude list is really great for those days that are just bad. They’re for the days that can only be summed up as a dumpster fire and you have to stop and think what you could possibly be grateful for that day. It forces you to look at the bad moments, sift through it and find the decently good parts that you can be thankful for. It’s not always easy. And some of the things I wrote down on those struggle bus days can be considered a stretch but it got me out of the endless cycle of negativity & the funk I’m in from that bad day.

My Challenge For You

You probably know what I’m going to challenge you to do.

Start a gratitude journal. For the rest of the year. That’s 42 days.

It doesn’t have to be an actual journal like mine. It can be a sheet of paper. A Word document. A note on your phone.

Use whatever method is going to work best for you & write down three things that you’re grateful for. Morning or night doesn’t matter to me just choose whichever works best for you.

Remember, gratitude is for those days where you’re not really feeling it just as it is for those days where you are.  

Gratitude is a small practice but it can create big shifts in you & your life over time. Give it a try. What better time of year than when it’s pretty much built in already?

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Comment below & tell me if you already practice gratitude daily & if it’s had any impact on you or if you’re going to start practicing it now. I’d love to hear.

Love & Happy Thanksgiving,

Looking for more Honesty Hours? Here’s one about the holidays, feelings, and letting go.