Gratitude Day 7

Welcome To Day #7 of 21 Days of Gratitude 

(click this link to go to the original source of this post)

Let’s start this week off with high energy.

Something fun, playful and a bit silly.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9z2ELaBVJY (3:20)

Action steps for today:

1) Can you really get into the energy of the Gratitude Dance?
Do you have enough child-like openess to try it for yourself? Can you
share the video with others and spread the message of happiness and
joy in the moment?

Share your comments by replying to this email.

2) Continue your daily list of 5 things that you are grateful for.

Elyse Hope Killoran

President,  Prosperity from the Inside-Out
http://www.choosingprosperity.com

Gratitude Day 6

Welcome To Day #6 of 21 Days of Gratitude

(click this link to go to the original source of this post)

Proactive Gratitude

Do you want to feel good, live a meaningful life and be abundant?

Laura King, a University of Missouri psychologist, says “Quit reading self help books and start helping others.”

Positive Psychology researcher, Keitko Otake and her colleagues, asked participants in a study to keep track of every act of kindness they did for a week. After one week the kindness group felt a boost in happiness and were much happier than the control group.

If you want to receive a tremendous dose of positive energy, challenge yourself to see how many acts of “proactive gratitude” or spontaneous acts of kindness you can do in a week?

These are the small things. Not what you can buy but what you can you do to help and support others. Not the things you feel obligated to do but the things you choose to do with an open heart.

Today’s action steps:

1) Keep track of the small things you do for others for the next week.

Share your comments by replying to this email.

2) For inspiration, visit the Random Acts of Kindness Foundation at:
http://www.actsofkindness.org/

3) Continue your daily list of 5 things that you are grateful for.

Appreciatively,

Elyse

Gratitude Day 5

Welcome To Day #5 of 21 Days of Gratitude

Today's post is a substitution for the original Day 5 from the 21 Days of Gratitude Project. The content comes from:  http://www.sedonameditation.com/GratitudeAttitude.html  and focuses on how gratitude brings us back into alignment with the present moment. I am really happy I found this article because I've been looking for something specific about gratitude and the present moment. Enjoy!

Cultivating the Attitude of Gratitude

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life.

It turns what we have into enough, and more.

It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, and confusion to clarity.

It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend.

Gratitude makes sense of our past,

brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.

 - Melody Beattie, author of Codependent No More.

When you're feeling grateful, your mind is clear, you have a sweeter relationship to the universe and its creator, and you become more aware of the big picture. The world becomes a friendly place to live. Every moment offers an opportunity for thanks. And every "thank-you" can return you to the present moment (another way to become present to what is REALLY going on.)

Keep coming back to present moment awareness

Every moment offers an opportunity for thanks. And every "thank-you" can return you to the present moment. Gratitude practice for me is about letting go of thinking and welcoming in the present moment. Accepting this moment as it is, and knowing that everything is happening for your evolution is a great practice too. “Faith is born of gratitude,” says Dr. Wattles, “ The grateful mind continually expects good things, and expectation becomes faith.”

You can also practice welcoming the present moment. Receiving. Every moment, every morning, every evening, and every meal is an opportunity to say thank you. A formal prayer isn’t required - easily bring your attention on what you’re grateful for in the moment, it can be a touchstone to the miracles of life that might have gone unnoticed. I often say thank you to the universe, the creator, and its every thing that created this moment. I appreciate the abundance that is present my life. That makes me feels good. 

Keep up the gratitude practice even when you don’t feel particularly grateful

When life is difficult and when you feel sorrow, great anxiety, or if you are dealing with a difficult relationship, choosing to be grateful can transform your perspective, even for a few moments, to one of appreciation and contentment for all that is: both the wonderful and the frustrating. Scientists have found that feeling grateful produces the endorphins in your brain, the same chemicals that reduce stress, lessen pain, and improve your immune functions.

Being grateful puts you in a totally different mindset and energy level, and enables you to reestablish your connection to your source, your spirit. It is impossible to be grateful and unhappy or in fear at the same time. The negativity and anger you had felt begins to dissipate. Peace and possibility envelope you. You can take a deep breath. The struggle stops and your heart calms. An attitude of gratitude and appreciation can trump negative emotions every time. Thank you.    

- Written by Sarah McLean

For today: Focus on the present moment by writing down 5 things you are grateful for today

About the author: Along with her 22 year meditation practice, Sarah McLean has explored world spiritual and cultural traditions: she's been a 2-year resident in a Zen Buddhist monastery, lived in an ashram in India, taught English to Tibetan Buddhist nuns, bicycled along the silk route through Pakistan, meditated in temples in Thailand and Japan, and trekked the Golden Triangle in Asia. Sarah McLean is passionate about teaching and sharing what she’s discovered about the modalities of mind/body health, self awareness and her spiritual journey.  Endorsed by Deepak Chopra and featured in The New York Times, Sarah is the founding director of the Sedona Meditation Training Company, where she teaches meditation and leads meditation retreats.

Read more articles by Sarah McLean

Gratitude Day 4

Welcome to Day #4 of the 21 Days of Gratitude

I am substituting something else I found from another website for Gratitude Day 4. Here is the link where I got it from:  http://www.iamthankful.com/  Check out this website for lots of free stuff: online gratitude journals, ecards, gifts, postcards, etc.

“Of course it’s easy to feel thankful when things go smoothly and life just handed you a blessing” says founder Damaris Pierce. “But faced with our daily challenges, we don’t know how on Earth we can feel grateful in the midst of debt, depression and complete overwhelm. It literally comes down to practice. Very few people go to the gym simply to be able to bench press 100 lbs, but rather to have energy and muscle strength to pick up the kids and the groceries, do the yard work and maybe not suck wind after climbing two flights of stairs.
Practicing Gratitude is the workout for our soul: repeatedly shifting our awareness towards the blessings of our lives enable us to not dwell on how someone has done us wrong or how life has supposedly handed us the shorter end of the stick. If you can condition yourself to look at the brighter side of life, it will only get brighter – especially while things don’t go your way!
So, make Gratitude your daily practice so that you will have the thankfulness muscle that lets you see the light no matter what life hands you. Today is the best time to start flexing that muscle!”

Action Steps for today:
1) Practice flexing your gratitude muscles today by shifting your awareness toward the blessings of your life, especially when things are not going as well as you would like.2) Continue your daily list of 5 things you are grateful for.

Gratitude Day 3

From: http://21daysofgratitude.com/index.php?paged=2

Welcome to Day 3 of the 21 Days of Gratitude 

Positive Psychologists Prove: Gratitude Is the Best Approach to Life

The results of a study on Gratitude (Gratitude and Thankfulness by Robert A. Emmons, University of California, Davis, and Michael E. McCullough, University of Miami) shows that a daily focus on gratitude leads to:

~ higher reported levels of alertness, enthusiasm, determination, optimism & energy
~ lower depression
~ decreased stress

along with an increased likelihood of:

~ helping others
~ exercising regularly and
~ making greater progress towards personal goals.

In addition, the findings reveal that people who feel grateful are also more likely to feel loved.

(Review highlights of this research in the new book “Thanks! How the New Science of Gratitude Can Make You Happier” and at: (http://psychology.ucdavis.edu/labs/emmons/)

The findings led investigator Robert Emmons to this conclusion:

“Our groundbreaking research has shown that grateful people experience higher levels of positive emotions such as joy, enthusiasm, love, happiness and optimism and that the practice of gratitude as a discipline protects a person from the destructive impulses of envy, resentment, greed, and bitterness.”

“So gratitude is a key to happiness, as I will argue from a scientific angle. And happiness is a good thing. An implicit assumption that many of us hold is that happiness depends on happenings - by what happens in our lives. We believe that success in life - whether the boardroom or the bedroom - makes people happier. Yet a recent review of the scientific literature on happiness revealed that happiness yields numerous rewards for the individual and precedes these outcomes. This means that happiness makes good things happen. It actually promotes positive outcomes. The benefits of happiness include higher incomes and and superior work outcomes…larger social rewards…more activity, energy, and flow…better physical health, and even longer life.”

Today’s action steps:

1) Consider the information above and let it percolate within you. Is gratitude more powerful than you had first thought?

Share your comments by replying to this email.

2) Continue your daily list of 5 things that you are grateful for in your Gratitude Journal.

With joy and wonder,

Elyse

Gratitude Day 2

Welcome To Day #2 of 21 Days of Gratitude.  (from http://21daysofgratitude.com/?p=7 )

Let’s start from the beginning. 

What is gratitude? 

If you search the dictionary you will likely find gratitude defined as a “feeling state.”  

The American Heritage Dictionary entry reads: “Grat·i·tude: noun. The state of being grateful; thankfulness.”

Gratitude is not an “emotion” such as happy or joyful.  

The feeling of gratitude arises as a result of positive focused thought which then triggers a positive focused feeling state. 

This distinction is very important because it reminds us that the experience of “gratefulness” or “gratitude” must be consciously chosen. 

Gratitude is an inner experience that does not come unbidden. Yet we each have the power to cultivate and expand this state in a very deliberate way. 

Over the next 21 Days we’ll be delving deeply into the experience of gratitude to learn about its unique powers. 

1)       We’ll explore the proven psychological benefits of cultivating an “attitude of gratitude.” 

2)       We’ll investigate the connection between gratitude and prosperity. 

3)       We’ll reveal the distinction between “reactive” and “proactive” gratitude. 

4)       We’ll experiment with specific practices that engender a feeling of gratitude. 

5)       We’ll illustrate how we can use gratitude to shift our emotional state. 

6)       We’ll learn how we can use gratitude to enhance our self-esteem. 

7)       We’ll come to understand how to employ gratitude as a transformational tool. 

        

Action steps for Day 2: 

1) If you have not already done so, go to: http://www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/ to register for a free account and to complete the Gratitude Survey questionnaire developed by Michael McCullough and Robert Emmons.   

2) List five things that you are grateful for today. 

3) For today, ponder this thought and reply with your comments about it: 

“The enlightened give thanks for what most people take for granted. As you begin to be grateful for what most people take for granted, that vibration of gratitude makes you more receptive to good in your life.” — Rev. Michael Beckwith 

With gratitude for your participation in this co-creative experience,  

Elyse Hope KilloranPresident, 

 Prosperity from the Inside-Out™

Gratitude Day 1

I found this amazing website http://www.21daysofgratitude.com/. I refered to it here and I've used it a few times with my clients. The ones who have actually followed through with it loved it. However, I find the original website a little difficult to navigate so I've broken down the days individually. I also have substituted material entirely on some of the days and I had to leave out a few parts because they don't apply now. But mostly the credit goes to the original authors of the 21 days of gratitude. Anyway, here is Day 1 of their amazing project. I will post one of the rest of the days each day (except weekends) until they are all here.

Welcome to Day #1 of the 21 Days of Gratitude Project (all info in this post is from 

http://21daysofgratitude.com/?p=6 )

The Daily messages are designed to reveal the innate power of the “energy of gratitude” and will draw upon: the scientific knowledge base of Positive Psychology, the directive support of the coachig model and the “alchemical power” of Metaphysics.

For our part:

~ From Positive Psychology: we will share information and assessments from the field of Positive Psychology to help you deepen your current understanding of what gratitude is and how impactful gratitude has been proven to be. 

~ From Coaching: we will encourage you to take the information about gratitude and apply it in practical ways so that you can achieve measurable results.  As it takes 21 days for a new habit to become fixed you’ll be right on schedule to make an “attitude of gratitude” become a seamless part of your life. 

~ From Metaphysics: we will be connecting the practice of “gratitude” to the notion of the whole “ask, believe, receive” process and we will support you in harnessing the power of gratitude on a consistent basis to manifest real-world results. 

For your part: you will read the emails you receive, once each day bringing an attitude of curiosity, a willingness to explore, and a commitment to participate fully in the process. 

Messages will be short and sweet and application should take less than 5 minutes each day.

And, upon completion, you will have a practical way to reflect upon your experience and come to your own conclusion about the power of gratitude.

So let us begin… 

Day #1 Assignment: We’re going to begin this “experiment” in a very practical way. 

First, we need a “before” measure of gratitude so that we can track how far we have traveled by the end of the process. 

For today: 

Go to: http://www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/ and register for a free account. (don't worry, this is really quick and both the questionnaires recommended below are super short)

There are dozens of enriching questionairres that you can complete on this site but, for today, we are most interested in getting an initial index of the Gratitude Survey questionnaire developed by Michael McCullough and Robert Emmons.  (Note: If you want to complete more than one survey, we recommend: The Fordyce Emotions Questionnaire and/or the VIA Signature Strengths Questionnaire.) 

Second, we want you to begin a daily gratitude activity.

For the next 21 days, do your best to list five things that you are grateful for in a gratitude journal. 

Looking forward to a remarkable journey,  

Prosperity from the Inside-Out™

Elyse Hope Killoran, President, 

http://goodmorninggratitude.com/2012/01/22/without-you-i-wouldnt-have-tried/