Think back to a moment in your life when you were deeply grateful for something or someone. What do you remember about how that felt? How did it affect your actions during the day or even the weeks or months following that moment? Did you feel energized? More alive? Perhaps more connected to someone or even more connected to your own personal values? Take a moment to just think about this. You can pick a big or small moment, a memory from years ago or a memory from yesterday. You can even just pick something you're grateful for right here and right now. If you're like me you might enjoy journaling about it. There's no right or wrong answer here. What is true for you is true for you.

For me one of the most profound periods of gratitude that I remember is when I first started dating my now-husband. I was so thrilled and just so deeply grateful to have found this person. I remember taking walks and noticing how beautiful the entire city looked. Every tree, every flower, every squirrel filled me with energy and appreciation for life! Not every example of gratitude has to be something dramatic like falling in love, but I like this example because when I remember that time I just remember how my deep appreciation for this person filtered into everything else that I did. It literally colored the way I saw the world at that time. Not only was I grateful for the love he brought to my life, but I also found a zillion more things to be grateful about in the process. Those feelings energized me in my work and in my efforts to care for myself. They made me embrace life.

I believe this is partly why the practice of gratitude is becoming more and more acknowledged to be fundamental to human health and happiness. I won't get into the science and research behind this today (I hope to in a later post), but if you can remember those moments of gratitude and how they made you feel, then the connection should be somewhat obvious. If it's not, then that's okay! Just bear with me here. 

When I talk about gratitude I don't mean it in a condescending way - like when someone uses the word in order to guilt you into belittling your feelings (like "Hey, well at least you still have a job [a grandmother] [a father] [a dog] [a limb] [insert choice guilt trip here]"). This is also not when someone tries to guilt you into overlooking their poor behavior ("Well, you should just be thankful I wasn't as bad as that other person" "You should just be grateful I didn't do something worse"). There are many ways that gratitude and thankfulness are misused terms in our world. I am not talking about those instances. I am not talking about using gratitude as a weapon of guilt.

What I am talking about is a practice of gratitude - a regular, intentional practice of taking time to appreciate the things you are grateful for. That doesn't mean you have to dismiss or ignore the negative things, but let's be real our minds do a fair amount of thinking about the negatives all day long. That's what minds do! They can't help it. They're trying to protect us from the things that are going wrong or could go wrong. It makes a lot of evolutionary sense for our minds to function this way. However, as a result, a lot of our mental energy is frequently absorbed in the pursuit of getting rid of that problematic stuff and less in the act of appreciating what we have and love already. When we allow this worrying part of our minds to fully dominate we wind up taking for granted the things that truly matter to us. We forget about how much we value that [toy] [car] [girlfriend] [husband] [house] [job] [coffee grinder] and move on to the next pursuit. 

There are many ways that I have tried to bring a regular gratitude practice into my life. One of them is gratitude journaling. When I find that my mind is tipping too far in a negative direction (oftentimes for me this actually leads to depression), I make sure to take out my journal and write 3 things that I'm grateful for. Usually what happens is that once I get 3 on paper, I suddenly remember more and more. Suddenly I have a list of 20 things that happened that day that I'm thankful for, and I wouldn't have even remembered them had I not taken a moment to write them down. Just as in my memory of falling in love, the act of acknowledging gratitude for 1 thing leads to many many more. If I'm doing this regularly I gradually find myself actively looking for the things I'm grateful for throughout the day. My attitude walking through my day shifts not so that I'm walking around in a daze but rather meeting the day with more energy, presence, and openness than I might have otherwise.

The practice of gratitude has made such a valuable difference in my health and happiness that I am making November the month of gratitude. Since November happens to be the month of the United States holiday of Thanksgiving (one of my favorite days of the year!) it seems like a very appropriate time to take regular stock of what we are thankful for in our lives. 

I'm calling this project 30 Days of Thankful. ("Thankful" seeming like the appropriate word to use during the month of Thanksgiving)

I'm inviting you to join me in giving thanks every day this month. You can do so in whatever way you prefer, whether that's journaling or saying a prayer, do what works for you. 

If you'd like to join me, I'll be posting something I'm thankful for on Instagram every single day for the month of November. Feel free to join me and respond to each post. You can also comment here, write me a message, or just reflect on your own. While you can certainly practice and respond privately I would truly love to know what you are feeling grateful for! I can't wait to hear from you!

Follow my Instagram page at the handle LisaBarksdaleHealthCoach (https://www.instagram.com/lisabarksdalehealthcoach/)