Gratitude is the best attitude


The purpose of life is to watch and experience living; to enjoy every minute of it. The ideal purpose of your life is that you are grateful—great and full; that you are alive, and you enjoy it.”

The frequency of gratitude is really a celebration of life. For instance, a bird shows its gratitude by chirping, a dog by wagging its tail, and a bee by buzzing. If you notice, all of life on this planet Earth is forever celebrating life. We humans express our celebration of life through the frequency of our hearts.

PHILOSOPHICAL ROOTS

One of the greatest minds in Western history, the Greek philosopher Aristotle, argued that we become what we habitually do. By changing our habits, we can become more thankful human beings. If we spend our days ruminating on all that has gone poorly and how dark the prospects for the future appear, we can think ourselves into misery and resentment. But we can also mold ourselves into the kind of people who seek out, recognize, and celebrate all that we have to be grateful for.

Now more than ever, you are either “living your life” or “dying your life.” Trying to hang on to things, situations, and people that are disappearing is “dying your life.” Yes, we are immortal beings living in a mortal body but the one thing that most of us take for granted is time. Truly, our tiny little mortal lives on planet Earth add up to only a tiny drop of water in the ocean of human existence.

GRATITUDE’S BENEFITS


Research shows that grateful people tend to be healthy and happy. They exhibit lower levels of stress and depression, cope better with adversity, and sleep better. They tend to be happier and more satisfied with life. Perhaps when we are more focused on the good things we enjoy in life, we have more to live for and tend to take better care of ourselves and each other. It is no surprise that receiving thanks makes people happier, but so does expressing gratitude.

It is easy to lose touch with this deep sense of gratitude since many of us have experienced so much loss these last few years. Many have lost friends, spouses, family members, jobs, money, home or health.

Dreams didn't work out as we expected and left us with a profound sense of emptiness. When the mind fixates only on the losses, it makes it impossible to reach this frequency of gratitude that lives deep within our own hearts. It is more important now than ever to send out gratitude—even to your losses, for they are now the story of your beautiful unfoldment in Spirit. This is about trusting that the Universe has removed everything that has been burying your greatness so that you can truly shine


PRACTICING GRATITUDE

Celebrate your life by living with an open heart in all your interactions with others. Show your gratitude through your smiles and your laughter. Show your gratitude by appreciating those who are in your life right now. Look around at everything you do have in your life—I bet if you start taking an inventory, it is a treasure chest overflowing with blessings.

Much in our culture seems aimed to cultivate an attitude of deficiency—for example, most ads aim to make us think that to find happiness we must buy something. Yet most of the best things in life—the beauty of nature, conversation, and love—are free.

There are marvelous respects in which we are equally blessed—the same sun shines down upon each of us, we all begin each day with the same 24 hours, and each of us enjoys the free use of one of the most complex and powerful resources in the universe, the human brain.

Make gratitude your daily prayer. Embrace gratitude as the new language you speak and you will experience the Universe responding through the infinite blessings showering down upon you. To take your place in the Unity of Life is to live in a perpetual state of gratitude.

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