Attitude of Gratitude in Action – WOMEN in RECOVERY

 

ATTITUDE of GRATITUDE is Key to Abundance

 

 

As difficult as it can be, one must say ‘ThankYou’ for all that one has; and stop focusing on lack.  

Start the morning with a first thought of ‘Thank God I woke up today, for now I have another chance’. Then, always end one’s day with a last thought of ‘Thank God for what I did accomplish today’.

Now, we all have those days where accomplishment appears empty, for growth is a slow process. On these days, KEEP IT SIMPLE, and end the day with ‘Thank God I made it through this day’.

Here are some steps to help you get started:

1. Awareness. Begin to consciously notice what brings you joy. Awareness is the first step toward creating change. Set aside time to participate in the process of experiencing and acknowledging your gratitude.

2. Inventory. Count your blessings each evening, noting down three things that happened during the day for which you are thankful. Be specific as you describe what happened to you. It could be a loving conversation with your partner, a hug from your teenage son, a lunch date with your mother.

3. Visualization. Spend time re-creating in your mind the happiness of the experience. You will feel your body becoming more relaxed, your emotions more positive and your thoughts more focused. The joys of life are not only in present activities but also in remembering pleasurable occasions.

4. Meditation. Think about what you did to open yourself to these moments. Then decide to direct your actions to include more of these delights in your life. Recognizing your own personal power will strengthen your belief in yourself as well as your willingness to consider the part others play in your happiness.

5. Awakening. Realize why this piece of good fortune came your way. It will help you identify the people you’re grateful to have in your life. You can then thank them for playing a part in improving your world.

The message here is to not only seek but find as least one event, item, emotion, etc. to be ‘thankful’….daily.

Once this becomes a Habit, one can practice this Action of Gratitude by the second; making this eventually a New Way of Living.

Gratitude, thankfulness, gratefulness, or appreciation is a feeling, from the heart or attitude in acknowledgment of a benefit that one has received or will receive. The experience of gratitude has historically been a focus of several world religions, and has been considered extensively by moral philosophers such as Adam Smith. The systematic study of gratitude within psychology only began around the year 2000, possibly because psychology has traditionally been focused more on understanding distress rather than understanding positive emotions. However, with the advent of the positive psychology movement, gratitude has become a mainstream focus of psychological research. The study of gratitude within psychology has focused on the understanding of the short term experience of the emotion of gratitude (state gratitude), individual differences in how frequently people feel gratitude (trait gratitude), and the relationship between these two aspects.