July Mindfulness Month Tools: Week Three

We have probably all heard of the benefits of starting a gratitude practice. I certainly did, and a couple of years ago I brought this beautiful journal, wrote a couple of entries and then forgot about it. When we decided at Chiropractic Balance that we were all taking on a mindfulness practice each week in July, I knew mine would be the gratitude journal practice. I’m quite excited to sweep off the dust and get back into it. One of my focuses regarding this practice is how to maintain writing in the journal throughout the month of July.  

I have read that you have more success if you create a ritual when trying to start a new practice. For me, this will include lighting a candle, playing some nice soothing music, sitting in bed and turning on the heater. Furthermore, as I am following the mindful practice of planning out my day the night before that Dr Matt has talked about last week, I will allocate 5 minutes of each day to write in my journal.

David Steindl-Rast, a Benedictine monk said in a 2013 ted talk the following thoughts regarding gratitude:

“What is the connection between happiness and gratefulness?

Many people would say, well, that’s very easy.

When you are happy, you are grateful. But think again. Is it really the happy people that are grateful?

We all know quite a number of people who have everything that it would take to be happy, and they are not happy, because they want something else or they want more of the same.

And we all know people who have lots of misfortune, misfortune that we ourselves would not want to have, and they are deeply happy. They radiate happiness.

You are surprised. Why? Because they are grateful. So it is not happiness that makes us grateful. It’s gratefulness that makes us happy.”

Here are some handy prompts to help you if your feeling stuck with what to write about: 

• Someone whose company I enjoy…
• A fun experience I had…
• The best part about today…
• An act of kindness I witnessed or received…
• A reason to be excited for the future…
• A valuable lesson I learned…
• Something I can be proud of…
• An unexpected good thing that happened…
• Something beautiful I saw…
• An experience I feel lucky to have had...
  

Gratitude Practice

“Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.” – Melody Beattie