On Marathon Monday, 2012, in the mid-afternoon, I was on Boylston Street, near the finish of the Boston Marathon, waiting for my cousin to run by so I could cheer her on.
On Marathon Monday, 2013, I was at the Franklin Park Zoo in Dorchester, MA, celebrating my birthday with my sisters and other family members.
This past week has been a roller-coaster of emotions, but most strongly, I feel a sense of gratitude. Gratitude that I and my loved ones are safe. Gratitude for the first-responders, who ran toward the blast, not away from it, and gratitude that, while we live in a world that contains evil, we also live in a world that can respond to evil with goodness, with courage, and with hope.
When bad things happen, such as the recent explosions at our beloved Boston Marathon, I am reminded of something a friend once told me: In nature, wherever you find a poisonous plant, you will also find the plant that contains the antidote nearby.
I comfort myself with the idea that wherever evil exists, goodness also exists. And I know that evil is not defeated with evil, but it can be vanquished with goodness as darkness is vanquished by the light.
One source of goodness in my life is my gratitude practice. If you don’t already have a practice of gratitude, consider starting one. I have written on the topic of gratitude before, but here I’d just like to write about a simple way to begin a practice of gratitude.
One Way to Cultivate Gratitude: Keep a Gratitude Journal (adapted from Thanks! How Practicing Gratitude Can Make You Happier by Robert A. Emmons, PhD)
- Keep a daily journal in which you record the blessings you are grateful for.
- Catalogue, each day, gratitude-inspiring events.
- Doesn’t matter what time of day, if you’re spelling is correct, or what you write in.
- The act of writing translates your thoughts into words. It helps you organize your thoughts and facilitates integration, and also helps you accept your own experiences and put them in context.
- Periodically update your gratitude list. (Do not allow this list to become stale, boring, a chore.)
- When reflecting on a benefit another has provided for us, we can break it into multiple components and reflect on each one. Writing about a specific trait, event, characteristic, or gift can be more beneficial that writing something generic. For example, rather than writing “I’m grateful for my husband,” I could write “I’m grateful my husband plays with my son so much.”
- Get started wherever you are, even if the only item on your list is “nothing bad happened today.” You can work up from there.
My gratitude journal has been a source of joy for me on good days, and a source of comfort on bad days.
May it be the same for you.
I don’t have a gratitude journal and don’t intend on keeping one, but I think it’s important to make gratitude a habitual practice. Every morning when I wake up at the crack of dawn I go downstairs and make my one cup of coffee and schlep back up to my office where I sit down at my desk and look out the window and sip and think about my day, and start a little prayer to God to thank Him/Her for what I have to be grateful for. Sometimes on a bad day/chaotic week, it doesn’t seem like much at first. But there is a shift that occurs in the process of consciously thinking about the good in our lives, in ourselves. It improve my ability to cope, to function in spite of the “bad” that surrounds me. It makes me aware of and appreciate the good that offsets the bad and gives me hope and inspiration.
Every night I do the same thing. Go to bed and for a few minutes I “talk” to God about my day – ask for help for whatever I need help with, and always, ALWAYS end by thinking about the good things I’ve experienced during the day. It might be small. Once, I remember having a terrible, horrible day and I was standing in the grocery line and there was a little boy sitting in the carriage head of me. He was so sweet and kept smiling and then offered to show me his ball. That night, that was one of the things I was grateful for – a stranger’s child – a moment of innocent sharing and a toddler’s smile.
These are hard times, but they ARE good times as well. Life isn’t perfect for anybody, but there will always be good in the world. Thanks for reminding us to be grateful!
Hey Laura,
Thanks for sharing your gratitude practice with us! I don’t think it really matters how we do it, as long as we do it! When I’m outside, especially in weather like we’ve had lately, I see the sun or feel it on my face and I am grateful. I pause and express my gratitude, and then keep going.
Thanks for your lovely comments!
Warmly,
Diane