Cultivating An Attitude Of Gratitude: Why You Should Bother

If you regularly find yourself feeling stressed, are constantly running against the clock, often wonder if there’s any point to it all anyway, and occasionally contemplate just burying your head under the bed-sheets and refusing to face the day then you might want to try something that’s worked wonders for me.
I’ll warn you – this might come off as a little corny at first, and you may wonder how it can possibly change anything. But the truth is that since I’ve employed this very simple 5-minute technique my life really has changed for the better. Not just my career as a blogger and freelance writer, but my health and fitness, and even the quality of relationship I have with my partner and my baby daughter.

But before I start to sound too salesman-y let me tell you what I’m talking about.

THE POWER OF GRATITUDE
The power of gratitude is an amazing thing. When you actively take the time to be grateful you’ll slowly but surely notice all the things you have to be grateful for. Things that you probably never really thought about and maybe even took for granted. I mean really – unless your typical is full of lottery wins, miraculous healings, and career breakthroughs – how often do you take the time to consciously be grateful?
 

YOUR DAILY GRATEFUL LIST

Try this. Take just 5 minutes each day to write a list of 10 things you’re grateful for. I like to do this in the evening for the day that has just ended. You can do it anytime, but I find expressing my gratitude at night really helps me relax and wind down before bed. Oh – and I’m not necessarily talking about finding big, huge, amazing things to be grateful for. You can be grateful for –
•    Having a roof over your head
•    The smell of fresh coffee in the morning
•    Your child’s smile
•    The ability to read and write
•    Good company
•    An upcoming social event
•    A new purchase or treat
•    Your willpower throughout the day – i.e. eating well or hitting the gym

These are just ideas to get the ball rolling. Once you start to write a grateful list every day I guarantee more and more things will start coming to you and your pen just about won’t keep up!
 

HOW GRATITUDE BEGETS SUCCESS

And then something amazing will start to happen. It might take as little as a few days, or it could be a couple of weeks but I guarantee you this. Once you start consciously being grateful for the good things in your life you’ll notice more and more things that you actually have to be grateful for.
Now I’m no scientist or psychologist so I can’t really comment on how this works exactly. But you know what? I don’t really care because if it works it works. And whether being grateful is simply opening my eyes and my mind toward a more positive outlook, or whether it’s actually creating new opportunity and success (which I honestly believe it is), either way I feel pretty darn good.

But I do know this. You get what you expect. And when you take the time to end each day with an attitude of gratitude it’s automatic that you’ll start to expect more good things to happen the next day. And that’s a whole lot better than going to bed focusing on the stresses or challenges behind and ahead of you. Wouldn’t you say?