Be honest, how grateful are you?

True confession time: recently I’ve been exploring Twitter as a way to gain perspective on interesting topics, like justice, faith, health, local news, and even my Atlanta sports teams.  It’s been quite an experience and, to be honest, it’s a bit like a rollercoaster (or an intellectual and emotional smorgasbord). There are insightful comments and links to well-written articles, but there is also an endless amount of anger and frustration, and a whole bunch of snarkiness (and memes, LOTS of memes). It’s clear that some people use Twitter to demonstrate how clever they are, but just as many individuals use it to show how angry, and scared, they feel.
 
I tend to avoid the heated political threads and really focus on how to best navigate this new entrepreneurial life of mine, so I have found myself consistently drawn to the “self-help” section of Twitter… the tweets that recommend the “5 habits of insanely successful people” or “42 books you need to read to become brilliant.”  I look at the links about how to eat better, sleep better, listen better, think better… you get the idea. Spend ten minutes on Twitter and you can quickly find out all the things you aren’t doing that you should be doing (waking up at 4:00AM like other legends of business!) and things you are doing that you shouldn’t be (letting yourself be distracted by social media, including Twitter!). 
 
SO. MUCH. ADVICE.
 
So as I was thinking about it this week, the cynical part of me (yes, optimists can be cynical) wanted to set aside all of this advice as basic marketing click-bait for my attention. Yet the more optimistic side of me feels a sense of gratitude for the rapid-fire reminders of how I can improve myself (and there is no lack of things I can improve upon). In this spirit, and thinking back upon the long list of articles I read about successful people and their success-generating habits, I have recognized that many of them share one simple quality: 
 
They are grateful. 
 
Simple, right? And here’s the catch: you don’t need to be super successful to be grateful. You just need to be… well, grateful.
 
Now trust me, I get it – gratitude is one of those things that sometimes feels hard to recognize, and even harder to express. Also, not everything sparks gratitude. Many of us experience real hardships and feel real pain that we would be grateful to avoid. But that’s exactly the point, isn’t it?  We should be grateful when we AREN’T experiencing those moments of pain. And we can be grateful for what we learned from those moments that challenge us. Yes, even the ones that challenge us down to our very core. Been there? I know I have. 
 
In response, I have found that gratitude, like most things, requires a growth mindset and a bit of practice. That’s not always easy. We need to recognize the good in our life as a basis for gratitude, but also see the silver lining in our challenges and failures as well. When we have a fixed mindset, we see change and discomfort as reasons for ingratitude. But when we shift to a growth mindset, we can see almost everything as a prompt to reflect upon what there IS to be grateful for. And of course a steady practice of intentionally thinking and expressing gratitude helps build those proverbial muscles of appreciation and thankfulness.
 
There are lots of gratitude practices (just check out Twitter!), but one that works in our home is our gratitude jar. It’s just a big glass jar with a stack of sticky-notes and a pen next to it. And it’s there to remind our family to take a moment on a regular basis and jot something down that we are grateful for.  It might be a good grade, or a nice win. It might be a special way we showed up for one another, or time we spent together as a family. Whatever that thought is, we write it down and drop the folded-up note in the jar. And no, we’re not perfect... sometimes we need to gently remind ourselves that our jar should be getting fuller, faster. But when the jar is full, we open it up over dinner and read the notes out loud to one another.  It’s a good way to remind ourselves that we can also be grateful together, and not just as individuals. Plus its always good for a few laughs too.
 
Whatever approach you use: a journal, a jar, or even just a quiet prayer, I bet the more you recognize gratitude for what you have (or had), the more optimistic you will be about what is to come.  Perhaps you might even choose to start sharing your gratitude with others, prompting them to journey down the path of expressive appreciation.
 
And maybe, just maybe, a mindset of gratitude will help us overcome some of our other mental models that hold us back from being who we are, as individuals and as communities.

Now that would really be something to tweet about, don’t you think?
 


Questions for Further Reflection:
 

  • What are three things you feel deeply grateful for? Why do you feel that way?

 

  • Think of one thing that is deeply challenging to you or has caused you pain. Is there  someone who you are grateful for how they helped you through that experience? Have you told them you are grateful?

 

  • Do you have a daily gratitude practice? If not, maybe set a reminder on your calendar to take a few minutes to think about what you are grateful for. Then jot those thoughts down in a journal, or put them in a jar (or maybe even tweet them)!

Seth Cohen