Saying Thank You

I know it’s an old cliché that we hear so often these days, but how often do we actually say thank you? I had been brought up to always say please and thank you, it was drummed in to me so much as a child that for me this was second nature. Of course I’m talking about saying thank you when I was handed something, saying please when I asked for something, saying thanks when in a restaurant, on a train, when someone was kind to me etc etc. This was to other people and about other people and everyday I excelled at this. However, it wasn’t until a few years ago that I actually started appreciating and being thankful for my everyday life and showing a sense of gratitude each and every day, for even the most mundane of things.

I’ll be honest, I used to be a bit of a whinger. I was always talking about (to myself and to others) how things were not good, how I wished that I had [x], how it wasn’t fair that so-and-so always seemed to land on their feet, and how my life felt like an uphill struggle… I could go on. My work friend and I used to go on a lunchtime walk every day and we would spend the entire 45 minutes moaning about everything. We seemed to think at the time that it was therapeutic to get it off our chest, but the more we whinged and moaned, the more we had to whinge and moan about! Then one January (as a New Year’s Resolution) I decided that I was going to try and turn things around and be more positive in this lunchtime walk, afterall it was so good for our bodies to be moving and getting fresh air, why shouldn’t we make this time positive for our minds too. VERY soon after this I really noticed a difference. Small at first …I wasn’t as bitter or envious of others around me and I didn’t start every afternoon after the walk focusing on other people’s faults.

Obviously, I couldn’t completely change my habits overnight, but little by little we stopped moaning so much and instead we thought of one thing each day that we were happy about. This then turned into me starting a “gratitude journal” (any excuse to buy nice stationery). At the end of every day I would write down three things that I was grateful for that day. Sometimes, when I had had a bad day the only thing I could think of was that I had woken up on time, or that I didn’t have to wait long for the bus, or that I had hot running water that morning (which of course I am super grateful for, but when you’re feeling very sorry for yourself this just feels like a given… it’s not!). Other times, it was much deeper things that I expressed my gratitude for. I would write three lines in my journal and each would start with “I am grateful for…..[…] and then I would end it with “thank you”.

I started being grateful for what I had already and not what I wanted to get and it was when I really started being thankful that positive changes took place in my life. I found that I was saying thank you for even the smallest of things and these were then turning into great things happening in my life. The things that had taken up so much of my time worrying about and feeling that they would never turn around, really did start to turn around. I found a great place to live, I was being noticed in my job for the hard work I was putting in, I was finding that my financial situation was improving and so on and so on.

You’ve probably heard the expression that if you give out positivity, then you receive positivity. I am a true believer in this. If you focus on only the negative, this is what you will receive and who wants a tonne of negativity coming their way?! I certainly don’t!

This has been a life changer for me. I’m not saying that my life is perfect, but it has improved so much since I started being grateful for what I already had instead of wishing I had more.

Even if you’re having a really bad day, you can always find something to be grateful for.

Do you keep a gratitude journal? Did you notice positive changes when you started this? Think of three things that you are thankful for in your life right now. Go on, try it. Let me know in the comments below.

Ta

L x