Practicing gratitude requires that we understand its source first.
We’ve all heard of the powerful impact of gratitude – how it provides relief from stress and anxiety. Many have claimed that it is essential to happiness, that taking note of the simple pleasures in life brings us joy.
Everywhere you turn, someone is selling a gratitude journal. However, we must dig beyond the surface level of merely note taking about we are thankful for in order to truly understand the depths of gratitude.
True gratitude fills our soul in a way that makes us unshakeable. It grounds us in the here and the now. It makes time slow down when the world is telling us to speed up.
In this article, I will help you to discover the source and meaning of true gratitude.
“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”
Matthew 6:2
The Source of Gratitude
The source of all gratitude is God. In a video titled “How to See God in Everything, Every Day,” by Father Mike Schmitz, he speaks about the secret to joy. In that speech he captures the true essence of gratitude when he says “the secret of the saint is recognizing every moment comes from God. They notice what is going on around them…They are not sleepwalking through it…They notice when someone else makes an effort to when a tree blooms…They are present to the moment.”
Practicing gratitude starts with our awareness that everything comes from Him. He gave His only Son so that our sins could be forgiven. He loves us for who we are in this moment and who we strive to be. Even when we stray, He still stands beside us holding out grace and forgives us over and over again. That is how much He loves us.
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believe in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.
John 3:16
Gratitude springs from the depths of God’s love for us. From this awareness comes the realization that God’s love is all around us. We find gratitude in the small “in between the lines” moments of life. I experience these moments of gratitude when my daughter puts her little arms around my neck, when I stop to watch my dog breathe as she sleeps, when I listen to the sounds of nature in the early morning…
These small moments of joy are abundantly all around us.
How precious to me are thy thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! If I would count them, they are more than the sand.
Psalms 139: 17-18
Where Gratitude is Not
In his book Enough, John Bogle, the founder and former CEO of the Vanguard Mutual Fund Corp., tells a story about a party given by a billionaire. One of the guests, turns to his friend author Joseph Heller, and tells him that their host had made more money in a single day than he had earned from his popular novel Catch 22 in its whole history. The friend responds, “Yes, but I have something he will never have …..enough.”
Money and the things will never be enough to buy our peace. Material things are like a well of water that will never satiate our thirst. We will keep going back to the well wanting more – a bigger house, a nicer car, a shinier ring… The goal post for happiness keeps moving farther and farther.
Exit the Race for More
Practicing gratitude requires that we shift our focus from the race for more to an appreciation for the simple. The accumulation of things will distract us from the things that truly matter, the things that we don’t need money for – connecting with God, people, nature.
One of my greatest pleasures is watching my young daughter learn how to swim on Tuesday nights. As I sit in the bleachers watching her challenge herself with every stroke, I can’t help but be thankful. I savor the moments when she stops to look at me at the end of a lap with a big smile on her face.
It is in these simple moments that I know I have enough. It’s easy in this hyper connected world of social media to feel the constant pressure to do and have more than others. That is a race you will never win. I give you permission to exit that race and enter the slow path of simple joys God has sprinkled all around us. That is where true gratitude is found.
Gratitude is in the Here and Now
It’s easy to get trapped in the “I will be happy when this happens…” mentality. We don’t allow ourselves to be happy in the time and place we are in now. We tell ourselves that happiness will come one day when we have more time, more money…
Let us saturate ourselves in the richness of today. Gratitude is the ability to make the common things feel uncommon. To find joy in what is right in front of us. Each of us can insert passion and joy into our current situation, regardless of the circumstance.
“Bloom where you are planted.”
Bishop Francis de Sales
Trade Your Expectations for Appreciation
In her book The Gratitude Diaries, Janice Kaplan says “if you trade your expectations for appreciation, the world instantly changes.” For example, instead of expecting a perfect split of household chores with your husband, try to notice and appreciate all of the things he already does for your family. Or instead of waiting and expecting the perfect job to come around, consider how you are making a difference in the role you are in now.
We can always strive for better circumstances, but if we don’t find gratitude in where we are today, we will never find it at all. Practicing gratitude requires us to flex our expectations with our circumstances – to appreciate the here and now.
“Peace is the result of retraining your mind to process life as it is, rather than as you think it should be.”
Dr. Wayne Dyer
Gratitude is in the Pit of Suffering
When things are going well, it is easy to take account of what we are thankful for. But when things are hard, that is where true appreciation can be found.
The deepest sense of gratitude is found in the pit of suffering.
Practicing gratitude even in the hardest of times gives us an opportunity to meet with God. God’s light shines the brightest in our lives when we are struggling. To see that light, we must shift our focus from our circumstance to Him.
He is trying to reach within us. He wants us to let go of control and let Him take the wheel. When you welcome God into your struggle, He can move mountains.
I remember a night when I took my daughter to the ER for the first time. From the second I got into the car to drive to the hospital, God was by my side. He knew I needed Him. I remember sitting in the ER by my daughter’s hospital bed feeling a sense of calm and strength wash over me. The feeling surprised me. I knew this strength was not my own.
Let God Carry You
In that moment, God’s strength became mine. It was then that I understood what true gratitude felt like. I was deeply thankful to know that even in one of my most challenging moments, God was not only by my side, He was also carrying me.
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness…For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weakness, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities; for when I am weak, then I am strong.”
2 Corinthians 12: 8-10
There is one thing we can be sure of in life – things will get hard. No one is immune to hardship. Challenging times will either break you down or break you open. Allowing God’s love to be our strength in these moments will break us open.
It is in the hardest of times that God forces us to dig into the deepest parts of ourselves. These are the times we find out what we are really made of, when we gain clarity on what truly matters. Everything else falls away. That is where gratitude is found – in the pit of suffering.
Pause and Take Note
Many of our days are spent on autopilot, pressing forward with the tasks of the day. Then before we know it, the day is over, and we are left wondering what we have to show for it.
God wants us to pause in our day, open our eyes and appreciate the small simple moments. Practicing gratitude requires us to create space in our daily routines to pause and take note of all that He has blessed us with. That is how we get off the hamster wheel of stress.
Practicing gratitude is essential to living a full and rich life. It is not the pursuit of more but the realization of enough. The realization that God’s strength and love in the good times and bad will always be enough – that is the essence of true gratitude.
“This is the day which the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.” Psalms 118:24
Psalms 118:24
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