Day 181 of 365 - Notes on Gratitude

Apparently, Oprah does it.  Many personal development authors and teachers routinely recommend it.  "It" is a gratitude journal.  You're supposed to keep a notebook and every night before you go to sleep, write down five things your are grateful for.  The idea is that what you express gratitude for will grow, at least according to self-help author Louise Hay.

Have I tried this practice?  Yes, I have.  Do I stick with it?  No, I do not.  I probably have more than one little notebook in a drawer from when I began this practice again, and again.

I know I am not alone in this.  I have at least one other close friend whose eyes roll to the back of her head when it is suggested.  There is something inherently irksome and arduous about it to me.  Maybe it feels like a test, or a report card, over which I will be judged by the wizard behind the curtain, or whoever.  So, when I do write in one of those little notebooks, I do it with resistance, and that can't be a good thing to grow.

Does this mean I am an ungrateful wretch?  No, it does not.  Does it mean I never feel or express gratitude?  Again, no, it does not.

I am absolutely okay with recognizing and acknowledging many things for which I am grateful as I go about my days.  I will say 'thank you' out loud or in my head in the moment that gratitude is experienced.  I even have become automatic in saying a thank you for lessons I am being shown in my life, things I don't necessarily like in the moment.  Saying the phrase, 'thank you for this gift of love', in my mind helps me with that.

Overall, I'm pretty satisfied with my appreciation of moments of gratitude in my own personal life.  Where I think I could step up to the plate more often about it, is in watching for what lights up people I know or meet and acknowledging it for them.  This is a suggestion by author Dawna Markova. I know it always energizes me when someone else recognizes this in me.  These might be things I notice in others but have not necessarily commented upon.  It does seem to me to also be a way of expressing gratitude for the spark we see in others.

In her book, We Are the Ones We Have Been Waiting For, author Alice Walker says, 'We must ask what is my practice?  What is steering this boat that is my fragile human life?  Whatever it is, now is the time to look for it, locate it, definitely, and put it to use.'

Although I don't feel I've found an ultimate practice to guide me, it's something I continue searching out and changing up to suit the phase of life I am in.  May you find the practice that works for you in your own time as well.

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