Well, here in the United States we have just celebrated Thanksgiving. If you are anything like me, you enjoyed some of your favorite foods and the time surrounded by those you love. Unfortunately, the next day people line up, trample each other, and almost incite riots to purchase their favorite gifts during Black Friday. What happened to the gratitude? We cannot limit gratitude to an event. We must make gratitude an essential part of our everyday lives. I hope these insights will empower you to embrace gratitude as a powerful force and a way of life. Never forget the undeniable power of gratitude!
- You must understand that complaining does not change your life. One of the most disturbing things to me is coming in contact with a person that constantly finds something to murmur and complain about. In fact, I have been criticized for being too positive and overly optimistic. While I believe that every person is entitled to their own opinion, I know for a fact that your life is enriched more by optimism than skepticism. What I am trying to say is that I have never seen complaining positively change anyone's life. Complaining is a thief of contentment and creates a spirit of apathy, indifference, and ingratitude. Complaining may bring a sense of emotional relief but it will ultimately rob you of eternal rewards. Make a quality decision that you will stop complaining about your life and instead start committing to change the things that are within your power to change. Complaining is a misuse of moments and a waste of energy.
- You have to choose to be grateful. While I could write an entire piece on this one statement, I promise to try and keep my comments brief. So many people in the world today are living with ungrateful hearts. In fact, we live in a culture and a society that feels entitled. In other words, they feel that certain things are owed to them by virtue of birthright. The reality is that nothing is owed to you and you must learn how to see every day as a gift and every moment as a treasure. From years of experience, I have learned that what you dishonor will depreciate in your life. On the other hand, what you appreciate will accrue in value in your life. In other words, you must realize how incredibly blessed you are and refuse to take anything for granted. Personally, I have made a non-negotiable decision that I will choose to be grateful every single day of my life. I have never forgotten where I have come from or the challenges that I have faced along the way. Moreover, I have not forgotten all the experiences that have shaped who I am today. When you choose to be grateful you invite abundance into your world and you embrace a life of no limitations and no boundaries.
- Find something every day to be grateful for. While we just established that gratitude is a choice, I want to take it a step further and say that gratitude is a daily practice that you must cultivate in your life. For more than twenty years, I have kept a gratitude journal and it has changed me in ways that I cannot even begin to explain. Initially, when I started keeping a gratitude journal I could barely come up with 3-5 things that I was grateful for every day. However, as time went on I started to find it easier to write down things that I was grateful for. In fact, I can now write down several pages of things that I am grateful for. What happened? As I took the time to find something to be grateful for every single day, my attitude changed, my perspective shifted and my heart was opened causing me to become a more compassionate and selfless person. I have never seen a grateful person that was miserable or living a meaningless life.
- You must embrace a lifestyle of contentment. As I stated earlier, we live in a very ungrateful world. No matter how blessed and privileged some people are they always find something to complain about in their lives. Much of this can be linked back to a lack of contentment. The antithesis of contentment is covetousness. So many people in the world today lust for what others have. Therefore, they are constantly living in a state of comparison and competition. They are miserable because they have not learned the art of contentment. I want you to understand that contentment is not settling for an inferior reality. At the same time, contentment is not self-seeking and self-preserving. Contentment is selfless and willing to sacrifice for the greater good. Contentment is being able to look at your life and see how abundantly blessed you are. Contentment is being able to find peace in the midst of peril, strength in the midst of storms, and hope in the midst of hardships. Contentment is a facet of spiritual maturity in which nothing happening around you has the power to influence what is happening in you. In other words, contentment empowers you to be unmovable in uncertain times.
