The Power of Expressing Gratitude

Feeling thankful and expressing gratitude has been likened to a powerful spiritual vitamin. Researchers find that people who regularly practice gratefulness experience better physical, emotional and mental health.

The practice of expressing gratitude seems to reduce stress hormone levels while increasing your ability to resist viral infections in the nose and throat. It helps keep your mind clear and your life more satisfying.

Grateful people exercise more and sleep better at night. Just like people who are happy, grateful people live longer, have higher incomes and more satisfying relationships.

Melodie Beattie says it well:

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion into clarity.... It turns problems into gifts, failures into success, the unexpected into perfect timing, and mistakes into important events. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow."

Share in the power of expressing gratitude by contributing your gratitude story and reading inspirational stories from fellow readers here.

Cultivating an Attitude of Gratitude

Feeling and expressing gratitude allows your heart to open and receive a blessing where you thought no blessing could be found. It helps you move through difficulties with greater grace and ease.

When you align with source energy in this way you are more likely to receive inspiration and guidance. You can better see the help and support that is there for you.

How often have you heard people say that their cancer was their greatest blessing? Or that in retrospect, so-and-so leaving them was the best thing that ever happened to them? Sometimes we humans need a little push to move forward. Sometimes it hurts. But when we look back, it is often with gratefulness and a realization that things did work out for the best.

What if you have a decent life, but still don't feel like expressing gratitude? What if you can only think about what you don't have and still want, so you feel miserable?

Like many of us, you've been conditioned to want "better" and more. You've been taught to never be satisfied. Not being satisfied equals not being happy. The trick is to feel grateful and satisfied even as you move forward to achieving what you want.

Why would God, the universe, Source, conspire to bring more blessings into your life when you aren't expressing gratitude for what it's provided you already?

Research shows that whatever you focus on strengthens its related neural pathways. If you focus on anger or lack or feeling sad, you build those pathways. Likewise, if you focus on words of gratitude, love and peace, you strengthen those pathways. In this regard, science has validated this working of the Law of Attraction right inside your own head.

To create more joy and inner peace in your heart and mind, add some of these practices of gratefulness to your life:

• Establish a daily habit of expressing gratitude. Offer a few heartfelt gratitude prayers for what you have. Be thankful for your health, your car, or your food and clothing. Marvel at a sunset or a sleeping baby. Thank the clerk who stands for hours to check you out of the store.

  Offer gratefulness for big and little things, even if appear less than "good". Saying thank you for the mundane, and even some annoying or difficult circumstances instantly shifts your perspective and relieves stress.

• If you enjoy writing, you might want to keep a gratitude journal or make gratitude lists.

• If visual reminders help you, post quotes about the power of gratitude where you are likely to see them. Find quotes or prayers that are meaningful to you. Or create your own. Read books, stories, psalms or other sacred writings of thanksgiving for encouragement.

• Sing spiritual songs of thanksgiving.

• Listen to this short gratitude meditation with Deepak Chopra as he guides you to be mindful of all you have to be grateful for.

• Look for the silver lining in the cloud. Here's an example. of something that happens to me more often than I'd like.

  Do you ever have to react quickly because someone cuts in front of you in traffic? Yes, allow yourself a moment to react. Then switch to an attitude of gratitude for the fact that you are safe.

  Go a step further and say, "Thank you for all the safe drivers on the road with me. Thank you for the driver that just cut me off. Bless him/her and keep everyone around that car safe." I can almost guarantee that this will short-circuit the rush of negative emotions and harmful chemical shifts in your body and you'll feel better.

  Again, gratitude isn't a call to inaction. If someone is creating a dangerous situation, please dial for help. And give thanks for the responders who keep the roads safe.

• During those times when you feel really low, make a conscious effort experience gratefulness for at least five things every day no matter how small they seem. Yes, there are five things. Dig deep. Offer thanks for breathing, having a beating heart, something to eat, a friend, a chance to begin again. You may still feel sad or upset, yet you will notice a feeling of peace in the midst of that feeling.

  Be thankful that this too shall pass. Whenever you feel yourself sinking into the mire turn on the power of gratitude. Say thank you for the situation even if you don't feel thankful. But be sincere. Tell yourself that a new day is coming. Look forward to it with a grateful heart.