Let’s face it -- gratitude can be hard work. And if not done correctly, is it worth it?  Is there really a “correct” way?  It all seems like a lot.  And practicing gratitude can sometimes be a to-do list checkbox.  Is that enough?  

Transcript:

Welcome to Everyday Happiness where we create lasting happiness, in 2-ish minutes a day,  through my signature method of Intentional Margins® (creating harmony between your to-dos and your priorities), happiness science, and musings about life. 

I'm your host Katie Jefcoat and we talk about gratitude a lot on this show.  But I wanted to dig a little deeper.  

First, gratitude is not writing a list for the sake of having a list without any emotional attachment to the words. That’s not the practice of gratitude, that is just the practice of writing.  Which can have its own benefits, especially if you revisit that gratitude list, but in this scenario, it’s just writing. 

Gratitude is not just an action.  Gratitude is a positive emotion that serves a biological purpose.

The goal of a gratitude exercise is to remember a good event, experience, person, or thing in your life—then enjoy the good emotions that come with it as you are writing your gratitude.  You want to feel the emotion to trigger those feelings and neurons in your brain. 

For gratitude to be effective to move the needle, it has to be authentic and move us somewhere emotionally.  You want that grateful energy to spur us forward and even more, to make someone else's life better. Gratitude can be the starting point for doing more. 

When we scan the world for gratitude and look for positivity each morning, our brains develop new neuro-connections and patterns that rewire our brains. So we are building our mental muscle to look for the positive and this is especially important when we are under stress, which is inevitable.  Your brain knows you have this exercise to scan for gratitude, so it knows it needs to collect data to complete the exercise.  So our brain is working in our favor.  That’s why it’s so important to do this now when you do not feel tremendous stress or negativity.   

What the science is finding is that happiness and gratitude is easier for some people, given their genes and their environment, but given the habit of seeking out new gratitude every single day, you can move yourself from a pessimist to a low level optimist. 

I’m curious how easy it is for you to find daily gratitude.  Let us know over on social, we’re in our DMs every day and we always respond.  

Until next time, do us a favor and follow our Instagram feed @everydayhappinesswithkatie because we are about to share some exciting news and we don’t want you to miss it. 

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