Hello my friends, here we are with episode 33.0. It is mid-November. It is almost thanksgiving. There is much to be thankful for. There is much to be angry and frustrated about. There is much to be worried about. We cannot be all of those things at high levels at once. Let’s all decide to go by way of grateful these next couple of weeks.
How do we move grateful up on our list of feelings right now? How do we appease our worry, anger, and fear and embrace the soft and gushy THANK YOU? How do we be grateful when COVID-19 numbers are high, we can’t do thanksgiving the way we have before, there is still great political divide, people suffering and much distress for our friends and neighbors? I don’t know exactly how, but I think we start with just deciding to put gratefulness in our daily practice.
I was scanning the radio stations the other day, and I heard someone poking fun at being grateful. I found it offensive. It just made me super mad. I do understand that the “Bless your heart” form of grateful can be annoying. This is the obligatory gratitude. I’m writing a thank you because my mom is forcing me to. I’m giving you a pie because I feel guilty or obligated kind of grateful. Yes, those forms of thankfulness are no good (though in the case of children, sorry, you write the thank you’s) if you live in my house. Genuine gratitude is thankful appreciation for what you have, whether it be tangible or intangible. It confirms goodness in your life and acknowledges that this goodness comes from many sources outside of yourself. For me, it includes a hefty amount of prayers of thanksgiving for my spiritual gifts and all the head starts I was given, which include a supportive family, good health, a strong ability to learn and grow, and tolerance and interest in people. I never feel closer to God than in prayer, and gratitude helps me connect with something larger than myself. So when I hear someone mock our need to be grateful, well, I want to poke your eyeballs out. It is not women or girls that need to be thankful. It is all of us.
Gratefulness is our everyday life work. Are we thankful when we get an unexpected gift, absolutely. If we get a negative COVID test- definitely, raise at work, holla, an unexpected visit from a friend, vacation day, indeed. But the mundane and stressful days make it nearly impossible to count blessings. It requires some work within us. The work we need to do within us is always what drives what is coming out of us. It is human nature to measure where we have been affected, categorize how we feel, and take notes on our own frustration. When our interest is focused on OURSELVES, in what we want and need, how we are being slighted, or on the ways our life is hard, we cannot be grateful.
Many years ago, one of my kids came home every day, really frustrated with a school friend. It was a broken record conversation that always ended, no matter how hard I tried, in advising patience and kindness. No matter what, I could sit and listen and nod for a few minutes, but I couldn’t help myself. By the end, I was saying things like, “When people are hurting, when people are suffering, they do the best they can. We do not know other people’s burdens.” The more I said it, the angrier my child became. I dreaded the afterschool conversation and its foregone conclusion of my kid giving me the silent treatment.
At my wit’s end, I started thinking about people in my life that I have been frustrated with or angry at and reflected on my strategy for that. I hate conflict with people; it’s one of my least favorite feelings. When I am super frustrated with someone’s behavior, I change that frustration into empathy. I feel sorry for them. I change the narrative in my head, and I imagine the load of their burdens and their inability to handle where they are. I suppose all that they didn’t ask for, the qualities they haven’t developed, all they carry with them, and their limited support. Once I do this, my anger turns to empathy, and I can decide if I can help, if I need to help or if I just need to leave it there. It is easier to feel sorry for someone than it is to be angry with them. It is SO MUCH easier. We cannot control other people’s behavior, no matter what we do.
My broken record of advice, in this case, was not helping. The following day, I told an honest story of someone I had been so frustrated with for so long but someone I care about. When I explained how I started to focus on the load she had vs. her challenging behavior, it helped me. My child responded, “So I need to treat them like a toddler like they don’t know better.” I mean, that isn’t exactly the way I would have said it, but it’s a start. I shrugged and said, “Yes, let’s try that. “After that, the after school conversation started to change. Suddenly there was less frustration and more empathy. The complaints became less and less each week. Suddenly there was room for appreciation of the human struggle. Judgment and condemnation take up a lot of space in us, and it leaves little room or energy for being thankful or grateful. It is an excellent time to appreciate this so we can move on.
The work of gratefulness can feel fluffy and weak; I assure you, it is not. That is why people recommend things like grateful journals or thankfulness days. Developing that habit has to be worked for. Once the pattern takes hold and gratefulness becomes a daily practice, we suddenly see joy, humor, and curiosity that we can easily miss when our focus is elsewhere.
Gratitude is not only a virtue; it’s a survival skill. This capacity can get more significant as times get more challenging. It is why it is often our least privileged, not our most, who appreciate the smallest of offerings. The research repeatedly tells us that when we practice gratefulness, we are happier and healthier. What is surprising is that newer research shows are that it isn’t the focus on positive words that are making the change; it is the absence of negative words. To say it another way, it was, in the example above, the shift from negative remarks about the friend’s behavior more than even the verbalizing of positive words that makes the change. It is where space is created.
Gratitude improves relationships, motivates people to work harder, helps us be more forgiving, and leaves space. This can be done a million other ways; it can be done in writing, prayer, or person. But think for a moment of the times in your life when you have been thanked and when you have been THANKED. I’m guessing you remember the ones in the second category. We remember them because we experience their authenticity. When we thank or are thanked most authentically, we feel it to our core, and we don’t forget it. We could use more of this right now.
I hope you will practice authentic gratefulness this month. I hope you will share it with others, and I hope it becomes a habit you never break up with.
Advice From A Friend: Make space for gratefulness