Gratitude Practice 2021 Day 365: The Power of a Year Long Gratitude Practice
Feb 8, 2021
Well. Tonight marks 365 days of this silly gratitude practice that I started well before the whole damned world went sideways. I’ve been a big big fan of gratitude for well over a decade. I’ve read all of the books and the research. I’ve listened to all of the gratitude podcasts and TED talks and I’m a big big believer...gratitude is an absolute game changer. I’ve used the tool of practicing gratitude daily a few times in the past to help combat some creeping situational depression that tends to loom and lurk in my world and I’ve found that practicing gratitude shifts energy, changes perspectives, helps to prioritize and recalibrate my thinking and my ability to process all of the stress and stimulus that swirls and spins inside my orbit. Practicing gratitude restores hope, reminds a person of truth and solicits a sense of sacred remembering in ways that I really can’t describe in words...and for me...that is saying something. And now after a full year of this dedicated daily practice I end this journey being endlessly grateful for….gratitude.
Practicing gratitude expands the scope of the world as once you start seeking out the good...especially when the darkness really starts closing in...you eventually start seeing endless purpose, not always ease or goodness or kittens and licorice level magic but real heartfelt life changing purpose, in just about everything. The lens of gratitude helps you see the beauty in the cracked pavement, in the hard heartbreaking conflict, in the frustrating stress struggle, in the wonder of wall climbing snails, in the simplicity of the basics like the unfathomable strength of shoe laces, the endless properties of paper bags and the impressive invention of whitening toothpaste. Practicing gratitude elevates the meaning of all things in ways that I will never understand. Gratitude helps to identify the beauty in the average stuff found in the everyday monotony and this process makes all of the difference. This determined mental choosing and framework has helped me savor and better appreciate and value the time spent connecting with a cherished girlfriend as we sit in the sun in our lawn chairs six plus feet apart for a few indulgent hours of critical catch up conversations; of the growth and development I have witnessed from my team at work as they have pushed through what will most likely be the most challenging year of our professional careers; and the incremental yet Herculean growth that Sarah Kate has made in the last year. The events of last year and all of the growth jam packed into each up and down has been mind blowing...and I feel so lucky to have been paying closer attention to all of it.
This new level of focus and awareness, gifted to me through a daily gratitude practice, has changed how I engage and respond and react to both the big and the little conversation and life connections. I find myself looking for good inside the crappiest moments and exchanges...and not because I need to sliver-line everything because so much of the last year has just been down right shitty...but because I just know that somewhere in the mix...and usually somewhere deep inside the dumpster fire of all things 2020 and now 2021...there is something to be learned and it will be of extraordinary value for me and so through this daily gratitude practice, I have learned to pause, then breath, then look and I mean really really look, unpack, stretch to understand, pitch what is not useful, and carefully tuck the learning and the experience and the meaning and eventual value deep into my heart and head knowing and trusting that in time the big juicy life changing insights and development will eventually rises to the surface. The result of this daily practice is growth first, sometimes heartbreaking gut wrenching grief and then always always gratitude.
This daily gratitude practice has changed how I view relationships, and connections and the roles we play in each other's lives. My gratitude for these connections has increased in extraordinary ways over the last year and largely because I ache for the old school face to face kind of exchanges that I completely took for granted. Practicing gratitude daily has helped me become more aware of the holiness of those who give space, and create space and hold space for others...space to rage, space to heal, space to rest, space to fail, space to rebound, space to learn, space to screw up space to forgive and ultimately space to grow. This daily practice has helped me appreciate that humans are all endless flawed and incredibly fabulous and there is incredible power in this frustrating duality. Through gratitude, I am more appreciative of those who have so generously provided me space to evolve and grow and improve. This new level of universal respect and gratitude for the goodness of the basic human connection has changed me fundamentally.
Practicing gratitude daily has helped me temper my growing anxiety of the unknown, the uncontrollable, the unforeseen and the unplanned for...all of which have shown up in force over the last year. The unthinkable events of 2020 and now 2021 have provided an endless curriculum for me to learn how to create and not seek after balance. And my growing ability to process all of this stress and stimulus has everything to do with my daily gratitude practice. It's like gratitude has been the filter for which all things have gone through and I can’t really separate where the impact of 2020 is from my growing gratitude practice. My silly goal to identify gratitude in my life everyday before the sunset forced me to push pause on the growing chaos long enough to get still and listen and look and breath and think and remember and reflect and then record and share what life was teaching me. This determined daily pause followed by an intention focused reflection has been critical to my survival and any success I have experienced over the last year. This practice has helped me develop new mental muscles and has increased my emotional regulation skills as I am now way more self-aware as to how I am showing up and responding to both the big and the little stressors. Practicing gratitude has helped me make better choices as to how I spend my time, my energy and my money as I continually find myself really asking...is this really going to generate more peace and joy into my world? Or is that comfortable, well loved, distractible numbing agent at play again and is this what I really want and need? The daily reflex of pressing pause and the following determined hunt for meaning and value and goodness has been an absolute game changer.
I don’t know if I will ever be able to untangle where and for how far this focused gratitude practice has reached into my overall 2020-21 experience. I read the news through the lens of gratitude. I processed the fear through the lens of gratitude. I reordered so much of my world through the lens of gratitude and I’m not a bit sad or sorry or regretful about it. For fear of sounding dramatic (I know...I know...me…? dramatic?...unthinkable) I think the only way I have survived the systematic unraveling and breaking and rebuilding and shattering and shaking and rumbling of raging of the last year is because of this silly daily gratitude practice. It has saved me. It has changed me. It has provided purpose and meaning in ways that I could never have imagined. It has consistently documented the daily ups and downs of the most extraordinary year and while it sounds so very very trite...I am so grateful for…this daily gratitude practice. It’s gone way way longer than I had ever expected or planned and it's been such a silly sacred soul stretching experience. So much of me has changed this year...so much more than my multiple hair colors and shrinking jean sizes. Practicing gratitude everyday for the year last year has transformed me in monumental ways and completely...and I could not be more grateful.
Today marks the end of this phase and forum of this daily gratitude practice...but there is no way that I’m ending this daily ritual or my writing and documenting of this exciting adventure. My musing and my writing will now live in a different space that I will share in time. For those who have stuck around...whew, you get a crown! Thank you for your patience...and this concludes my TED Talk on gratitude. For those who have found any values or insight in the reading of my endless words...I guess you welcome and I’m sorry and I’m grateful for your support and encouragement and friendship. And for those interested in a good hearty soul stretch I can’t recommend this daily practice enough.
