In the past, I have discussed why I think keeping a Gratitude Journal is an awesome thing to do. And, it is time to talk about it once again! After all, when something works well, you want to tell people about it! Best part about it is that it fits ANY budget! You can start off not costing anything!

I have been keeping a gratitude journal for some time now. Even though it has been in different forms, I have found that I feel empty when I am not using one. Have you ever kept one? While I am asking questions, do you know what one is?

What is a Gratitude Journal?
Anything can pretty much be a gratitude journal – an old notebook, a loose-leaf folder, a dedicated journal notebook, an electronic document, or even a collection of scraps of papers! There is no right answer to that it physically is – whatever works best for you and your lifestyle is what you should use.

Now that you have an idea on what it is physically, let me tell you what it REALLY is. A gratitude journal will become one of your most treasured items you possess! Within your journal, you will be writing down all the things for which you are grateful.

Your journaling can be something that is structured, such as writing down all the things for which you are grateful that occurred in the day; this writing can be the last thing you do before going to sleep. Or, as something comes into your mind, you can simply write it down. You can take time to write down as many things as you think at one sitting, or simply as they come into your thoughts. Your Gratitude Journal should always be readily accessible so when the inspiration hits you, you have the ability to capture the thought!

As you interact during the day, think about what you can journal about – this will often put you in a more gratitude-filled mood. When you are searching for gratitude, you will easily find it. When you spot something, write it down. You can date each entry or just keep it free flowing. If you want to personalize it, you can include pictures you have taken to help immortalize the moment.

If you ever feel like you have had a miserable day and nothing seems to be going your way, simply open up your Gratitude Journal and start to read what you have written. After reading a few things, your mood and spirit will shift 180 degrees and help put you back into having an Attitude of Gratitude.

If you are skeptical about doing this, try it out for 21 days. Start with a notebook and date each page, starting with today. Commit to writing something for each day. After 21 days, look to see how you are feeling. You will see that by just journaling each day, you will feel like a new person.

Resources:
• Things I have used for my Gratitude Journal:
• Simple spiral notebook
• Loose-leaf binder
• A nice leather binder with exchangeable filler pages (currently in use)
• I have created a document using Google Docs (http://www.google.com/docs) – this was accessible to me no matter where I am (as long as I have an internet connection)\
• There is an iPhone app – Gratitude Journal
• For my Mac Desktop, I have used Journler (http://journler.com/)

Be Well.
Paul.

Sign up for the Gratitude Quote of the Day at:
www.AllAboutGratitude.com

What is the simplest way to start working towards an Attitude of Gratitude? Just say, “Thank You.” This easy, little phrase is the cornerstone of expressing your gratitude and puts you in the state of mind of Thanks.

Meister Eckhart said, “If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, “thank you,” that would suffice.”

By announcing your thanks out loud for the the world and the universe to hear, you are acknowledging  your gratitude and allowing it to resonate throughout. Now, one of the very key points involved here is to speak it out loud as well as feel it. If you only say ”thank you” in order to go through the motion because it is the right thing to do, you are missing the point. Certainly being polite is important, but you can be polite without being grateful. Being polite without gratitude is just being courteous.

You should feel your thanks when you say thank you. You should truly mean it in your core being. If you get the warm fuzzies when you say ”thank you” to someone, you are well on your way to having a wonderful Attitude of Gratitude.

Be Well.
Paul.
The Gratitude Guru

What is the simplest way to start working towards an Attitude of Gratitude? Just say, “Thank You.” This easy, little phrase is the cornerstone of expressing your gratitude and puts you in the state of mind of Thanks.

Meister Eckhart said, “If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, “thank you,” that would suffice.”

By announcing your thanks out loud for the the world and the universe to hear, you are acknowledging  your gratitude and allowing it to resonate throughout. Now, one of the very key points involved here is to speak it out loud as well as feel it. If you only say ”thank you” in order to go through the motion because it is the right thing to do, you are missing the point. Certainly being polite is important, but you can be polite without being grateful. Being polite without gratitude is just being courteous.

You should feel your thanks when you say thank you. You should truly mean it in your core being. If you get the warm fuzzies when you say ”thank you” to someone, you are well on your way to having a wonderful Attitude of Gratitude.

Be Well.
Paul.
The Gratitude Guru

Parents frequently bemoan what they see as a lack of gratitude or appreciation from their children. They may consider their children to be spoiled or blame popular culture for a general lack of civility. How often do parents say things like: “Kids today have no appreciation for what they have. Why, in my day…etc.”

The ability to show gratitude is more of a learned behavior than an innate trait.  We need to ask ourselves how well we model this behavior.  How often do we express our appreciation to our children? How often do they hear us expressing appreciation to a spouse, parent or other relative? How often as a family do we discuss the things for which we are thankful?

Unfortunately, we may be more likely to inadvertently pass on negative messages. The normal reaction to feeling unappreciated is anger and resentment. Sometimes we stop doing things for others if they don’t meet our expectations for thankfulness. Other times we may label others as selfish, rude or ignorant. Whether we realize it or not, these are clearly behaviors that we are modeling.

There are several things we can do which are far more constructive and which should yield better results. Here are some ideas:

• Make it a practice to tell your children how much you appreciate them and give them specific examples of things they did that merited thanks.
• At least once a month, go around the table at dinner time and ask each person to say one thing for which they are thankful.
• Make up a story that involves the theme of gratitude.
• Stress the importance of thank you notes and make sure you practice what you preach.
• When children are young if they do not automatically thank someone who does something for them, prompt them with a statement such as, “What do you say?”
• Give examples of things you were thankful for during the day. “So and so did ____ and I really appreciated it.”
• Do a volunteer project that will involve the entire family and talk about why it’s important to help others.

Be patient, be persistent and try to stay positive.

This is a partial reprint of an article by Mike Daly, Director of Youth, Adult, and Community Services in Campbell County, VA.

Be Well.
Paul.
The Gratitude Guru

Have you shown gratitude for you body lately? Our bodies really are temples.  Think about everything they do for us. If you stopped for a moment and show your gratitude towards yourself, you will see how much your physical being has to offer not only you, but everyone else. Your flesh and bones are beautiful, graceful and powerful structures that provide the ability to heal, nurture and provide a vessel for our spiritual self. By honoring and giving gratitude for this vessel, we are really saying Thanks to that which created it! Express your gratitude to your maker be it the Universe, God, Allah, Being, Consciousness or who/what ever you believe in.

Expressing your gratitude for your body need not be limited to just speaking it or thinking it. Give your body the best food, exercise and care thatyou can.  Eat healthy, whole, living foods as much as possible.  Reduced the amount of junk food you eat. Try to limit or even stop intake of animal, processed foods and dairy products.  Eat whole wheat instead of white bread.  Eat brown rice instead of white rice. Drink a tall glass of purified water before meals and go for a walk after you eat.

Of course you should include a regular routine of exercising  every day (or at least every other day). If you start simply be elevating your heart rate to the correct level (not straining yourself), you would be surprised to see how much  just half an hour a day can change not only your body, but your mind and spirit as well.

Have gratitude to your body for all it does for you.  Be grateful for the body you have and care for your body no matter the weight, shape, height or condition. Even if you want to change your body, accepting it in the current state is important to facilitate the changes you want to see.  Promise your body continued love and nurturing. Be grateful that you are able to walk, talk, dance, sing, see, hear and all of the things we seem to take for granted on a daily basis.

Last but not least, listen to what your body has to say.  It tells you what it needs and when it needs it.  Often times our minds/emotions can play tricks on us but our body is always honest with us.  Love and nurture yourselves and amazing results will quickly follow. Gratitude comes easier when you mind and body are in tune with one another.

Be Well.

This is being repost with permission from Glen Hopkins.

Imagine for a moment one of those nights when you just can’t fall asleep and you have to get up early the next morning for a very important meeting of which you are the keynote speaker. Your alarm clock goes off early in the morning waking you from what little sleep you had. You stumble out of bed, have a quick shower, grab a coffee and some toast, and off you go to fight the traffic on the way to work.

Does that sound like the start of a terrible day? Most would answer ‘yes’. Few people however, would answer, ‘no’. These are the people, who are in my opinion blessed with a gift. A gift that determines how they view their life. These people live with ‘an attitude of gratitude’. For them, the situation described could be worse. Much worse. For example, think of the man who doesn’t have a bed, let alone a roof to over his head. When he is awoken from what little sleep he is able to get, it is by the rain falling on his cold body. He too stumbles to his feet and begins his journey to work in his bare feet. His work is in the field of survival. He searches though garbage cans for scraps of half-rotten food to eat and odd bits of clothes to keep him warm.

The purpose of this example is to illustrate that we all have so much to be grateful for. Even in times when it seems that nothing could be worse, there is always a reason to be grateful. And when you feel a sense of gratitude, you feel a sense of happiness and content. My challenge to you today is to learn to look for the good in every situation and live with ‘an attitude of gratitude’.

I assure you, if you were the fellow searching for food in garbage cans you too could find things to be grateful for. You just have to look hard enough and ‘open your eyes’ to what is around you. You have to focus on what’s good in your life, not what’s bad.

“I once was distraught because I had no shoes, until I met a man
who had no feet.” – Unknown

Life works in mysterious ways. Time and time again there have been stories of people who are in a dire strait yet they are found helping others who are experiencing greater turmoil. This is because once you have helped someone in greater need than yourself, you always feel better. You feel better because you have helped another human being, and this forces you to change your mindset from focusing on your problems to focusing on their solutions.

Always focus on the solution, not the problem and live with an attitude of gratitude! Mother Teresa was a primary example of this phenomenon. Her entire life revolved around helping others in need. As a result she experienced a great deal of love and self-satisfaction in her life.

I challenge you now to take a moment to think of five things in your life that you are grateful for today. For example, your friends, your family, your job, your sense of smell, touch, sight, and sound. The list can go on and on. Imagine
what your life would be like without these things. Write them down on a piece of paper and really think about the things you are grateful for. You will be amazed at how great you will feel!

Glen Hopkins
www.GlenHopkins.name

I have discussed this briefly in the past, and I think this is a good time to talk about keeping a Gratitude Journal and why it is an awesome thing to do. I have been keeping a gratitude journal for some time now. Even though it has been in different forms, I have found that I feel empty when I am not using one.

What is a Gratitude Journal?
Anything can pretty much be a gratitude journal – an old notebook, a loose-leaf folder, a dedicated journal notebook, an electronic document, or even a collection of scraps of papers! There is no right answer to that it physically is – whatever works best for you and your lifestyle is what you should use.

Now that you have an idea on what it is physically, let me tell you what it REALLY is. A gratitude journal will become one of your most treasured items you possess! Within your journal, you will be writing down all the things for which you are grateful.

Your journaling can be something that is structured, such as writing down all the things for which you are grateful that occurred in the day; this writing can be the last thing you do before going to sleep. Or, as something comes into your mind, you can simply write it down. You can take time to write down as many things as you think at one sitting, or simply as they come into your thoughts. Your Gratitude Journal should always be readily accessible so when the inspiration hits you, you have the ability to capture the thought!

As you interact during the day, think about what you can journal about – this will often put you in a more gratitude-filled mood. When you are searching for gratitude, you will easily find it. When you spot something, write it down. You can date each entry or just keep it free flowing. If you want to personalize it, you can include pictures you have taken to help immortalize the moment.

If you ever feel like you have had a miserable day and nothing seems to be going your way, simply open up your Gratitude Journal and start to read what you have written. After reading a few things, your mood and spirit will shift 180 degrees and help put you back into having an Attitude of Gratitude.

If you are skeptical about doing this, try it out for 21 days. Start with a notebook and date each page, starting with today. Commit to writing something for each day. After 21 days, look to see how you are feeling. You will see that by just journaling each day, you will feel like a new person.

Resources:
• Things I have used for my Gratitude Journal:
• Simple spiral notebook
• Loose-leaf binder
• A nice leather binder with exchangeable filler pages (currently in use)
• I have created a document using Google Docs (http://www.google.com/docs) – this was accessible to me no matter where I am (as long as I have an internet connection)

• There is an iPhone app – Gratitude Journal
• For my Mac Desktop, I have used Journler (http://journler.com/)

Be Well.

Sign up for the Gratitude Quote of the Day at:
www.AllAboutGratitude.com

When I wake up in the morning, after I hit the alarm clock to snooze, or turn it off, one of the first things I do before getting out of bed is to run through a list of things that come to me for which I am grateful. I place no importance on the order of things that come to mind, nor do I concern myself with ‘finding’ something to be grateful about. It is a Gratitude Stream of Consciousness that starts my day off right!

It is those first moments when you are awake and conscious that set the mood for the rest of the day. By starting out the day by being grateful, your whole perspective changes. Imagine the different ways you would feel between these 2 scenarios:

Scenario #1 – You wake up and immediately think:
1. UGH! It is way to early and I am still exhausted!
2. I hate going to work. I need to find a way out of there.
3. I better pay the electric bill today, because the late notice arrived 2 days ago.
4. That jalopy of mine better start today. I cannot be late again for work.
5. What the!??! Why is my spouse all the way over on my side of the bed? No wonder I feel cramped this morning.

Scenario #2 – You wake up and immediately think:
1. Wow! Listen to those birds singing outside. Just listen to how happy they sound singing to the new day.
2. What is this? Look how cuddly my spouse is this morning sleep next to me. I am so happy and grateful that we are together.
2. I can’t wait to get to work today. I am so grateful that I have a job in these times where others do not have a job. Even with the economy in tough times, I am fortunate enough to be employed!
3. I am grateful for my computer that I have in my office. It is such a great time saver and helps me manage all my documents, my emails, my videos, my new book I am compiling, the other book I am writing. It allows me to blog each day. What an awesome part of my life! I am so grateful it is a Mac!
4. Wow! Tonight I get to teach my computer cl
ass. It is going to be a great class and I am grateful that the students are going to show up and listen to what I have to say. This is my opportunity to make a difference in these students.
5. I love my car! I cannot imagine getting another vehicle. I love the way it handles, I love the acceleration, I love my XM radio in the car, and I love cruising to work listening to my iPod.

Which way would you rather arise in the morning?

I am sometimes grateful for things that have not yet come my way. I am grateful for the million dollars that is going to be deposited into my bank account one day. The money is out there, I just need to get it into my account! So even if there is something that you are hoping for, or wishing for, or something that you would like to get, you can still be grateful for it. You will get it in time.

The more you are grateful for what you already have, the more that will come your way. The Universe, or God, or Buddha, or Spirit, or whatever Universal Being you belie
ve in, is rewarding you with more of what you have, but only if you are grateful for it. If you are not grateful for that which you currently posses, why would you be rewarded with more? If what you have now is not good enough for you, why should you get more?

What are you thoughts about this? Leave a comment and let me know.

Be Well.

I am completing my new compilation of Gratitude Quotes in an eBook that I will be publishing soon. You are more than welcome to get a copy of it for free. It is packed with some really great quotes that I have sent out on the Quote of the Day as well as some new ones. The eBook is focusing on only Gratitude which (in my opinion) makes it that much more powerful.

One of my favorites is in there:

“You say grace before meals. All right. But I say grace before the concert and the opera, and grace before the play and pantomime, and grace before I open a book, and grace before sketching, painting, swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing and grace before I dip the pen in the ink.”

- G.K. Chesterton

Isn’t that great! Talk about having an A
ttitude of Gratitude! When you find gratitude in everything you do and everything you think, you are automatically in a better state of mind! I have recently experienced a shift in my thinking. Work has been exceptionally challenging over the past couple months for reasons you probably care not to be bored reading. But, when I find myself “challenged” or unable to comprehend the rational behind decisions that are made (which are outside of my control), I quickly look for the positive in the situation. I think, “Wow – it is great that we are getting additional resources to help out with this project. I am grateful for working at a company that is willing to get people to help when so many organizations are not hiring.” That quickly shifts my attitude from resentment to thankfulness.

Remember, however, when you are doing this, you cannot simply just think about it and process the words and the meaning behind it, but you need to feel it in your core. When you
can feel it emotionally, you are truly being grateful.

Be Well.

Paul.