Practicing Gratitude

A deviation from my usual topics with a dive into one of the best qualities a person can have

Good afternoon everyone and happy belated Independence Day. Things have been quite busy for me recently, thus the pause in article production. However, everything that has been going on for me has opened up a door to this topic of gratitude. Taking the time to slow down and appreciate everything I have in my life has helped tremendously with easing my amount of stress.

Gratitude is defined as the quality of being thankful; readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness

I see gratitude as much more than a quality. Cliché as it may sound, expressing gratitude is a way of life. It is something you can practice, progressively improve upon, and develop into a habit which then becomes ingrained into your way of life.

The importance of being able to express thanks and appreciation for everything in life cannot be overstated. It is shown to increase health, happiness (of yourself and others), decrease stress, and increase optimism. All of this is great, but my favorite part is that it simply feels like the right thing to do.

Why would you not want to make other people feel appreciated? Approaching gratitude with this type of mentality makes it easy to implement small acts that can mean the world to people - whether it is writing thank you cards, calling family members, opening doors for others, or simply putting your phone away when socializing. Taking action to show appreciation and gratitude to strangers, friends, and family is a surefire way to live a happier and healthier life.

I also believe that this way of life is contagious. The more you show joy and gratitude throughout your day, the more others will do the same. Imagine how fast this can compound if everyone slowly starts to practice showing a little more gratitude.

My implementation of gratitude?

For the foreseeable future, I am going to write down one thing a day that I am thankful for. This will help me be conscious different ways to show gratitude, and ensure that I don’t get complacent and can really drill this in as a habit.

And because I like to include a graph or two:

Image Source: Oxford Languages

I’m not going to look into the accuracy of this graph and simply take it for what it is: everyone in the world could show a little more gratitude in their lives.

Do something nice for someone today, you never know what may happen.

I appreciate you reading,

Joey