Grateful not satisfied

So now that everyone is coming off their turkey coma, have had their fill of family time, and maybe bought more junk that they didn’t need, I thought I would bring up a topic that has always irked me.

Why do most of us wait until this time of year to focus on gratitude and saying thanks?

It seems as if because everyone else is doing it we may just as well join in, right?

This time of year, I see people thanking every customer, every employee, every vendor and anyone that will listen to them spout out these seemingly forced messages of gratitude.

It generally lasts a week or so, then everyone gets back to normal, blasting those that cut in front of us on the highway, berating employees who haven’t measured up this year, and becoming more like the Scrooge in The Christmas Carol.

Now that is probably an exaggeration(imagine that, a sales guy exaggerating?) although it gets us to my point.

Why do we wait a whole year to express this thankful emotion?

For those of you who have ever received a written thank you note from anyone, you may know what I am talking about.

I recently shopped at the Theory store at Sawgrass Mills, had great service, enjoyed my experience and thought that was that.

One week later, I received a handwritten note that thanked me for shopping there and offered service beyond that one visit.

That was in June, and Thanksgiving was nowhere in sight.

I spoke at a great event in Cleveland in early October, The Secret Service Summit, they treated me like I was a king, and sure enough, I received a written note with my picture, thanking me for helping to make THEIR event the best ever….

Craziness, what’s going on here? Being thankful when it’s not Thanksgiving?

Same thing when I spoke in Denver, top guy at Avison Young sent me a note thanking me for sharing my thoughts with his team.

Four Seasons, Golden State Warriors, MainSource Bank, The DiJulius Group, Signature Pro, Theory all took the time to make me feel special!

Time and time again, I am overwhelmed when I receive these nice little notes in the mail.

Wouldn’t it be awful if I had to wait for one week in November to feel this way?

So here’s the point, I am sure we all have something to feel thankful for every day, someone who makes us feel special, and wouldn’t it be nice if we let them know it, right then and there.

Try to think back to that birthday party, or graduation or wedding, when people gave you a gift, and your mom insisted on having you send thank you notes.

You probably hated it, although you made the folks who received it feel very special! (By the way, that’s one of the keys to being great in sales, make people feel special)

Think of the possibilities.

Truth be told, I have been sending them out for as long as I can remember, as I had my own cards made, so that they are readily available to send out on a regular basis.

HANDWRITTEN NOTES OF GRATITUDE GO A LONG WAY!

My final thought on this subject is this, being grateful, while a daily practice for me and most of the other successful role models I follow, should not be confused with satisfied.

In fact, I live life with an attitude of gratitude, and by sending out these little notes to people on a regular basis, it is just more validation of what Aristotle said “We are what we repeatedly do, excellence then is not an act but a habit”

Small things done consistently create the greatest results, so while very grateful, not even close to being satisfied.

Gotta go, have more thank you notes to write.

And that’s what Nudelberg says

Steve