If you do not already actively practice being grateful in your every day life, you’ll want to pay close attention to this article.
Research has shown that being grateful is extremely good for you.
Gratitude can lower your blood pressure, improve your immune system, help you sleep better and more efficiently, improve your heart health, improve your mood, boost your energy and keep your brain healthier and younger.
And the benefits are not limited to the above list!
One study found that those with a consistent gratitude practice reduced their dietary fat intake by as much as 25 percent.
It’s easy to get bogged down in the negatives of every day life. Plus, 2016 wasn’t exactly kind to many of us – at least, that’s what my Twitter and Facebook feed has shown me. However, if we choose to focus on the positive, we can begin to shift our mindset and start our own personal gratitude practices.
My favorite way of practicing gratitude is relatively easy. If you want to start to develop your own gratitude practice, this is probably the best way for you to start.
Every night before I go to sleep, I list five things for which I am grateful. They do not have to be big things. It can be as simple as having a warm bed to sleep in, a smile from a stranger during your walk to work or school or having your favorite home cooked meal.
Obviously, some days will be easier to list things you are grateful for, whereas other days may be harder. However, that’s where being grateful for even the smallest things can help shift your mindset.
You may have had a day where everything went wrong. Your boss yelled at you. You got a bad grade on a test. You totaled your car. You lost your job. You got into a fight with your best friend. You had a breakup.
But, if you are able to look at the smallest things to be grateful for, despite a major negative life event, you can easily realize that life is not so bad.
I’m not saying that recognizing the positives in your life will erase the negative things – but it will certainly make you realize that there is a silver lining to everything.
Another way to practice gratitude is to see the positive in a bad situation. For example, that breakup you are going through may be the door to self-discovery and self-love. Instead of focusing on how you are now alone, you can focus on doing something solely for yourself, something that will bring you joy and happiness. In the end, that happier, more joyful you will attract more people than you could even imagine.
Maybe you lost your job. Sure, it’s not exactly convenient, and maybe you don’t know what you’re going to do next, but maybe losing your job was actually the universe’s way of pushing you into something new and better for you.
There are all sorts of ways to practice gratitude. Making a list every night before you go to sleep or keeping a gratitude journal and writing in it regularly are just two ways of doing so.
I make it a habit of practicing gratitude for the good and the bad in my life. I’m not a doctor, so I don’t know if my heart is healthier or if my brain is younger, but I do know that focusing on being grateful has helped improve my mood, especially when I was feeling down, and I do have very low blood pressure.
If you are interested in this topic, I also highly suggest checking out Gabrielle Bernstein, a New York Times best-selling author and public speaker, who has published various books on gratitude and other topics. I discovered her six years ago, and her work has helped me become happier, more grateful, and more in tune with myself.
