“Embrace Gratitude: 10 Life-Changing Benefits Of Thankfulness.”

” What this power is I cannot say, all I know is that it exists and it becomes available only when a man is in that state of mind in which he knows exactly what he wants and is fully determined not to quit until he finds it.”

_Alexander Graham Bell

Gratitude is really an underestimated subject matter. An average population of the world uses the word “thank you” numerous times a day but do they actually mean it? 

Do you actually mean it when you thank others? 

Well, 9 out of 10 times we don’t actually mean it. But what happens if we can say thank you every time from the bottom of our hearts. 

 Do you want to know what will happen if we can nor actually feel but also can express gratitude for everything around us. 

Cultivating gratitude can help us in everyday life. 

The healing power of gratitude

Have you ever heard about the magical effects of words and thoughts on our health? Let me clarify this concept by this example, 

Suppose If you and your friends have a festive dinner together and go home feeling happy and energized . But a few hours later one of your friends called you and said that everyone who had dinner together had a stomach ache and had to rush to the hospital. What would you feel? 

You who were fine just a moment before must  start having the same pain in your stomach too. 

What is that? That means the words of your friend send a signal to your mind that something was wrong with the food and you should be feeling the same as everyone else does. 

This example can clearly describe that “we are what we think”. When we think that you have chronic pain that cannot be treated you are sending a signal to your mind that pain should persist because it has no treatment. 

On the other hand when you wake up every morning and tell yourself that we are fine and energized, having no pain. It can clearly tell your mind that your body should behave that way, feeling healthy all day long. 

So having gratitude about your health and your body can elevate your health. When you think you are healthy you will feel healthy. And when you feel healthy you will automatically be thankful to your God and your body

Gratitude’s magic touch on relationships

Having gratitude towards relationships can strengthen the bond. Romantic, family, friends, social, business on every relation gratitude can have a positive impact. 

Being grateful to others doesn’t mean you have to say thank you for every other thing they do, it only means you have to feel that way. 

When you can actually learn to put yourself into another person’s shoes you will learn to be grateful for that person. 

For cultivating gratitude you can make a ritual in your home that before starting a meal everyone should tell one good thing the other family member did for him. This can promote an atmosphere of help and appreciation. 

As well as exchanging gratitude letters between couples can deepen their relationship. 

Climbing the success ladder using gratitude

Another great benefit of gratitude is when you have good socio-personal relationships you have a higher chance of success in your life. 

Humans are social creatures. We live in a society where we are dependent on each other in  every matter of life. So when you can strengthen your relationships through gratitude you have the better chance to be successful in life. So surround yourself with positivity and people worthy of your gratitude. 

Multiplying goodness in every day life

Consider good things as muscles the more you use them the more they grow. The key here is putting your heart into some things. When you think of good things happening to you the more you will attract goodness. It has the snowball effect, when you roll down the snowball it will get bigger and bigger in size. 

Similarly the more you focus on bad things, it will only increase the bad happenings. 

So gratitude can help you glorify the good things happening around you and help you appreciate them and be grateful for them. So make life snowball of positivity. 

Optimism unveiled story

I once heard a story about an award show which was going to award a big among of money to the painter who can paint a picture of peacefulness. Every painter of the time was really enthusiastic and brought their masterpieces to the show. One picture portraying a greenland with sun rising behind mountains and other portraying a night full of stars and clear sky. In short every piece was a masterpiece and the decision was a difficult one.

 But when the judges announced the results everyone was shocked because they chose a picture of a stormy night with rain and thunder. 

It was difficult to accept the decision so few painters went to the judge to inquire about the decision and tell them they must have mistaken something. But the judges smiled and told them that there was no mistake. They asked the reason why they chose that participant’s picture which was unlikely to win. 

Judges told them that ordinary person can only see the thunderstorm but what they can’t see is that there is a small hut and in that hut there is a person standing in a window. 

But despite the bad weather there is peace on his face and this is the true meaning of peace. Peace is when the outside world can not affect your inner world, that means you need to stay optimistic in every situation and that is the biggest example of gratitude. 

In order to cultivate gratitude you need to be able to see the positive to retain inner peace. 

Present moment bliss

Gratitude forces us to stay in the present moment. The more we stay in the negative past we feel depression and the more we stay in the negative future we feel anxiety. So to avoid both we need to make a habit of staying in the present moment in which gratitude can help us. 

Think about it, when we are eating we are either watching TV or something on the phone. That makes us lose the taste of food, so we can’t enjoy the food. So focusing on food while eating can help us to be grateful for what we are eating. 

Another example could be if you have a habit of going for a walk in nature, you won’t be able to see its beauty unless you live in the present moment and enjoy the pleasure that nature gives us. And once you will be able to see the beauty of nature you will be able to have gratitude for the creator and the gratitude for having eyes which enables you to see the world around you. 

Resilience forged in gratitude’s journey

Gratitude enables you to be resilient in life. Every time you face any difficulty it helps you to see the other side of a coin. And when you can see another perspective of life it helps you to better solve the problem . Gratitude can act as armor that shields against the uncertainties of life.

The happiness symphony of gratitude

Research consistently shows the link between gratitude and happiness. Study has shown that the person with a grateful disposition tends to experience higher positive effect, life satisfaction and emotional well-being. 

It has once seen an interesting experiment, in which scientists gathered a few people and asked them to write a letter to a person they are truly grateful for. And when they wrote that letter, they were asked to call that person and tell them what they wrote in a letter. 

Few people were able to call that person and tell them personally what they wrote in a letter but some weren’t able to get through to the person whom they wrote a letter for. 

At the end the people who were able to tell others about their gratitude towards them were extremely happy but the person who wasn’t able to do so didn’t see any noticeable effect in their behavior. 

So we can say that the more you will express gratitude the more happy you will be.

Gratitude as a stress buster

Stress is the result of fear. And all fears are based on imaginations. When we imagine that we are going to experience something horrible in the future , it causes us stress. And gratitude helps us to focus on the present which helps to reduce stress about something unknown. 

Gratitude helps us to surround ourselves with positive expectations of the future which as a result reduces stress and anxiety. 

Gratitude beyond material wealth

Gratitude helps us to shift our focus from material possessions to intangible aspects of life. Humans by nature have a lust for more, he believes that the more he has the happier he will be. But that’s not true.

When you do some research on happy people you will find out they don’t have much wealth but they are happy because they are satisfied with what they have and this is called gratitude and the people who are billionaires have everything but happiness most of the time. 

It tells us that happiness has nothing to do with wealth and cultivating gratitude can reduce your lust for materialism and teaches you to stay content with what you have. 

Read more,

https://www.helpguide.org/articles/mental-health/gratitude.htm