More on Gratitude

I just read an article this morning on gratitude. I liked what it said. Here's a clip...

I'm utterly convinced that the key to lifelong success is the regular exercise of a single emotional muscle: gratitude.

People who approach life with a sense of gratitude are constantly aware of what's wonderful in their life. Because they enjoy the fruits of their successes, they seek out more success. And when things don't go as planned, people who are grateful can put failure into perspective.

By contrast, people who lack gratitude are never truly happy. If they succeed at a task, they don't enjoy it. For them, a string of successes is like trying to fill a bucket with a huge leak in the bottom. And failure invariably makes them bitter, angry, and discouraged.

Therefore, if you want to be successful, you need to feel more gratitude. Fortunately, gratitude, like most emotions, is like a muscle: The more you use it, the stronger and more resilient it becomes.
There's a little more to the article, so if you're interested in reading more it came from here.

I'm going to try using that muscle a little more today. How about you?

Practicing Gratitude

I'm trying really, really hard to practice this today. Today I'm in a place where I'm not struggling with gratitude about "what I have" - it's more about "what I am". And for me, that's a much more difficult place to be. I'm going to take a long, hot bath bubble-bath tonight and try to help put my mind at ease. Bubble...bubble...

A Few Words on Gratitude

grat·i·tude  [grat-i-tood, -tyood]
noun
The quality or feeling of being grateful or thankful: He expressed his gratitude to everyone on the staff.
 
Earlier today I was email-talking to a good friend [yes, you know who you are :-)] about trying to be more grateful and positive on a daily basis. Let's face it - life can be difficult - and some days, it's so easy to let the difficulties drag you down.
 
For example, here's one of my current issues:  Do I have a roof over my head? You bet. Does my roof leak right now? Yup - it sure does. Crap. Am I going to let that "sink" me [pun intended!]? Nope!
 
Even through the difficulties of something like not being able to afford to have my house re-roofed, I want to be able to keep myself in the you-can't-drown-me-even-when-I'm-down place [ha - another pun intended! - I'm on a roll!]. I want to be able to live a more upbeat, positive, happy life - so I'm going to work hard on practicing gratitude on a daily basis.
 
I found this posting about living a life of gratitude. It was very inspiring for me today. Check it out if you think you want to join my little gratitude journey. Gratitude

In the meantime, I wish you...

Image taken from http://www.abundance-and-happiness.com/gratitude.html - another great resource for practicing gratitude!