Thanksgiving is just a few days away here in the States…YAY!! This is by far one of my favorite holidays. For me it always comes with feelings of warmth, joy, peace, and gratitude. It’s a time to look around you and really see how your life has changed over the previous months and have gratitude for it…all of it.
It’s easy to have gratitude when things have been going well. When everything has been coming up roses it’s easy to pick a bouquet. But what if your life has been a shit show in 2015?
Being happy is a choice. Being grateful is a choice. If we decide to wallow in the shitty things that we’ve had to deal with, this is also a choice. Working with gratitude during the harder times is almost more important than using it during the easy times.
It’s important to remember that being grateful and feeling grateful aren’t the same thing. Don’t try to force yourself to feel something you don’t.
Did You Know…
The original Thanksgiving celebration was born out of hard times and strife. Thanksgiving was not originally a feast celebration but a four day prayer celebration that happened as a way to give thanks for those that had survived the harsh winter. The dates of when this celebration happened has been estimated at being anywhere from May to July. While offering prayers of thanks for those that lived through the winter the Pilgrims also prayed for rain, good weather, and a fruitful harvest so more people could live through the next winter. The Thanksgiving feast we think of today originated from a 1621 celebration after the colony had its first successful harvest. President Abraham Lincoln declared it a national holiday of “thanksgiving and praise” in 1863.
The Biggest Way to Find Gratitude During Your Personal Shit Show
Look for opportunity. Look for the lessons. This is how we find gratitude through the tough times.
Look at what’s been happening that’s been hard and try to separate from the emotions of the whole scenario and look at it more objectively. What opportunities can you seize from this?
An example might be losing a job. We know the obvious issues with that – money will be tight. It’s easy to focus on that and worry about money and how you’ll pay the bills or afford the luxuries that you have come to expect in your life. But what opportunities might there be in this?
With the loss of a job opportunities could include starting a new career path, finding clarity on what you really want to do with your life, realigning with your purpose, general downtime, shifting your financial priorities, getting back to basics, and having a little time to focus more on things like your health and your spiritual practice.
Does this mean you should ignore the need to find a new job? No. But it does give you something different to focus on and to find gratitude for so you’re not only focused on the negative. Remember that if you’re focused on the negative you’re just going to feel and manifest more of the negative. This is why gratitude in tough times becomes key to getting past them!
And when it comes to lessons, we can always learn more about ourselves and what we’re made of when we go through a tough time. Those lessons can be priceless.
Now Let’s Start a Gratitude Practice
A few years ago I created a Thanksgiving freebie for tracking gratitude and it was a big hit. Each year since I’ve make a few shifts to it and shared it again. I hope you’ll take this gift and use it! It’s a practice that can have a profound effect on how you end 2015 and start 2016.
The free digital workbook is designed for you to print out and use as a daily journal for tracking all that you’re thankful and grateful for over the course of 30 days. What I suggest is printing it out and using the side of the page with the gratitude prompts as suggested but then use the blank backside of the page to free journal about your day and what you learned about yourself from your gratitude practice.
To get your gratitude journal click the button below and then be sure to share this post with the share buttons below to help others start their gratitude practice. Remember, sharing it caring!
Have a Wonderful Thanksgiving!
“It’s important to remember that being grateful and feeling grateful aren’t the same thing. Don’t try to force yourself to feel something you don’t.”
Dang that really resonated with me Jess!! Thanks for sharing that wisdom. <3